Guidelines for the investigation of chronic diarrhoea in adults: British Society of Gastroenterology, 3rd edition.

Chronic diarrhoea is a common problem, hence clear guidance on investigations is required. This is an updated guideline from 2003 for the investigations of chronic diarrhoea commissioned by the Clinical Services and Standards Committee of the British Society of Gastroenterology (BSG). This document has undergone significant revision in content through input by 13 members of the Guideline Development Group (GDG) representing various institutions. The GRADE system was used to appraise the quality of evidence and grading of recommendations.

Faecal immunochemical testing (FIT) in symptomatic patients: what are we missing?

OBJECTIVE: Faecal immunochemical test (FIT) shows promise as a non-invasive triage test for colorectal cancer (CRC) in the symptomatic population. The aim of this study was to assess the use of FIT within the recent NG12 and DG30 National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) guidelines. DESIGN: A single-centre prospective study of patients referred to University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust via the 2-week wait (TWW) pathway between January 2015 and March 2016 was conducted. 612 patients were reviewed, of which 519 were found to meet the NG12 criteria and 79 met the DG30 criteria. Data included age, sex, symptoms, colonoscopy or CT colonography, histology and FIT results. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: FIT was performed in all patients and sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value and negative predictive value, with 95% CI, for cancers and adenomas within each pathway (TWW, NG12 and DG30) was calculated. RESULTS: CRC sensitivity in TWW pathway patients, NG12 and DG30 group was 86.84% (95% CI 71.91% to 95.59%), 84.85% (95% CI 68.1% to 94.89%) and 100% (95% CI 47.82% to 100%), respectively. Specificity was 82.23% (95% CI 78.85% to 85.27%), 81.28% (95% CI 77.52% to 84.65%) and 91.89% (95% CI 83.18% to 96.97%), respectively. Adenoma sensitivity in the groups was 30.69% (95% CI 29.9% to 40.66%), 30.77% (95% CI 21.51% to 41.32%) and 25% (95% CI 3.19% to 65.09%), respectively. CONCLUSION: Use of FIT within the remit of the NG12 NICE guidelines shows a high sensitivity and specificity and may be an effective triage tool when considering whether to perform investigations. However, there is still a miss rate. FIT within DG30 has excellent sensitivity and improved specificity; however, DG30 targets lower risk groups and accounts for only 13% of the entire referrals for suspected cancer. Therefore, managing the larger, higher risk NG12 group may require the addition of another test or marker to ensure that CRC is not missed.