Should the bowel cancer screening age be lowered for people with a learning disability?

Problem

The LeDeR 2021 report (White et al., 2022) demonstrated that cancer of the colon and rectum (bowel cancer) accounted for 13.6% of cancer deaths reported to LeDeR in 2021. Bowel cancer screening is currently offered every two years to people between the ages of 60 and 74. The average age of death for the people reported to LeDeR that died of bowel cancer between 2018 and 2021 was 61.7 years. This statistic might indicate that lowering the age threshold for bowel cancer screening in people with a learning disability could prevent people dying earlier. This work aims to investigate whether the bowel cancer screening age should be lowered further than the current proposed age for the general population and, determine what age would be appropriate to initiate screening for people who have a learning disability.

Approach

Using date from reviews of deaths notified to the LeDeR programme, we will investigate deaths of people with a learning disability who died from bowel cancer. Quantitative descriptive statistics will provide insight into the demographic profile of those who die from bowel cancer and comparative statistics will analyse the profile of people who died from bowel cancer with a learning disability compared to those who died from bowel cancer from the general population using ONS data, including age at diagnosis and long-term conditions. Information about how many people who died from bowel cancer had the condition diagnosed through accessing the national screening programme will be reported.

Findings

This work is in progress (due to be completed in the summer).

Consequences

We hope this work will provide evidence that supports the lowering of the age of bowel cancer screening for people with a learning disability and indicate at what age screening would be appropriate in this population.