Rapid communicationsHow many endoscopies are performed for colorectal cancer screening? Results from CDC’s survey of endoscopic capacity
Section snippets
Sampling frame
The sampling frame included all US medical facilities known to have purchased or leased lower endoscopic (sigmoidoscopy and colonoscopy) equipment between January 1, 1996, and December 31, 2000. We obtained lists of these customers from the 4 leading US endoscopic equipment manufacturers: Fujinon Inc, Olympus America, Pentax Precision Instruments Inc, and Welch-Allyn. We also obtained a list of all single-specialty and multispecialty ambulatory endoscopy/surgery centers (AECs) in the United
Results
Survey respondents identified themselves as physicians (81.6%), nurses (5.7%), and “other” (12.7%), which included administrators. Responding physicians identified their practice specialties as gastroenterology (49.0%), internal medicine (21.5%), surgery (16.9%), and family or general practice (12.0%).
Surveys were classified by practice specialty according to the type of physicians performing the majority of endoscopic procedures (gastroenterology, primary care, surgery, or mixed). For mixed
Discussion
This report presents new information on the number of practices in the United States performing flexible sigmoidoscopy and colonoscopy, the physician specialists performing the procedures, and the current and potential volume of lower endoscopic procedures nationally and regionally.
Of all specialists who responded to our survey, gastroenterologists performed most of the flexible sigmoidoscopies and colonoscopies, although primary care physicians and surgeons performed a substantial proportion
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M.T.M.’s current affiliation is: National Center for HIV, STD and TB Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia.