New technologies improve adenoma detection rate, adenoma miss rate, and polyp detection rate: a systematic review and meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: The need to increase the adenoma detection rate (ADR) for colorectal cancer screening has ushered in devices that mechanically or optically improve conventional colonoscopy. Recently, new technology devices (NTDs) have become available. We aimed to compare the ADR, polyp detection rate (PDR), and adenoma miss rate (AMR) between NTDs and conventional colonoscopy and between mechanical and optical NTDs. METHODS: MEDLINE and Embase databases were searched from inception through September 2017 for articles or abstracts reporting ADR, PDR, and AMR with NTDs. Randomized controlled trials and case-control studies with >10 subjects were included. Primary outcomes included ADR, PDR, and AMR odds ratio (OR) between conventional colonoscopy and NTDs. Secondary outcomes included cecal intubation rates, adverse events, cecal intubation time, and total colonoscopy time. RESULTS: From 141 citations, 45 studies with 20,887 subjects were eligible for ≥1 analyses. Overall, the ORs for ADR (1.35; 95% confidence interval [CI] 1.24-1.47; P < .01) and PDR (1.51; 95% CI, 1.37-1.67; P < .01) were higher with NTDs. Higher ADR (OR, 1.52 vs 1.25; P = .035) and PDR (OR, 1.63 vs 1.10; P ≤ .01) were observed with mechanical NTDs. The overall AMR with NTDs was lower compared with conventional colonoscopy (OR, .19; 95% CI, .14-.26; P < .01). Mechanical NTDs had lower AMRs compared with optical NTDs (OR, .10 vs .33; P < .01). No differences in cecal intubation rates, cecal intubation time, or total colonoscopy time were found. CONCLUSIONS: Newer endoscopic technologies are an effective option to improve ADR and PDR and decrease AMR, particularly with mechanical NTDs. No differences in operability and safety were found.

The Effect of Colonoscopy Reimbursement Reductions on Gastroenterologist Practice Behavior.

GOAL: The purpose of this study was to assess the effect of decreased colonoscopy reimbursement on gastroenterologist practice behavior, including time to retirement and procedure volume. BACKGROUND: In 2015, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services proposed reductions in colonoscopy reimbursements. With new initiatives for increased colorectal cancer screening, it is crucial to understand how reimbursement changes could affect these efforts. STUDY: Randomly selected respondents from the American College of Gastroenterology membership database were surveyed on incremental changes in practice behavior if colonoscopy reimbursement were to decrease by 10, 20, 30, or 40 %. Data were analyzed using both Pearson's Chi-square and analysis of variance. RESULTS: Two thousand and nine gastroenterologists received the survey with a 16.3 % response rate. Procedure volume significantly decreased with degree of reimbursement reductions (p < 0.001). With a 10 % decrease, 72 % of respondents reported no change in the number of colonoscopies performed. With a 20 % decrease, 39 % would decrease their procedure volume, while 21 % of respondents would increase their procedure volume. With a 30 and 40 % decrease, procedure volume decreased by 48 and 50 %, respectively. In terms of retirement, current plans predict a cumulative retirement rate of 29.4 % at 10 years. More than 42 % of respondents plan to retire after 2030. In the 2014-2023 retirement subgroup (N = 74 responses), there was a significant hastening of retirement year at 20 % (p = 0.016), 30 % (p < 0.001), and 40 % (p < 0.001) reimbursement reductions as compared to baseline responses. CONCLUSION: Decreasing colonoscopy reimbursements may have a significant effect on the effective gastroenterology work force.

Assessment of mutational load in biopsy tissue provides additional information about genomic instability to histological classifications of Barrett's esophagus.

PURPOSE: Progression of Barrett's esophagus (BE) to esophageal adenocarcinoma (EAC) is associated with accumulated genomic instability. Current risk stratification of BE for EAC relies on histological classification and grade of dysplasia. However, histology alone cannot assess the risk of patients with inconsistent or non-dysplastic BE histology. We, therefore, examined the presence and extent of genomic instability in advanced and less advanced BE histology using mutational load (ML). METHODS: ML summarized the presence and clonality of loss of heterozygosity (LOH) mutations and the emergence of new alleles, manifested as microsatellite instability (MSI) mutations, in ten genomic loci around tumor suppressor genes associated with EAC. The ML of 877 microdissected targets from BE biopsies was correlated to their histology. Histological targets were categorized into three levels: no ML, low ML, and high ML. RESULTS: Increasing ML correlated with increasingly severe histology. By contrast, proportions of targets that lacked mutations decreased with increasingly severe histology. A portion of targets with non-dysplastic and low-grade histology shared a similar ML as those with higher risk and EAC disease. The addition of MSI characterization to ML helped to differentiate the ML between advanced and less advanced histology. CONCLUSIONS: Given that EAC is associated with accumulated genomic instability, high ML in less severe histology may identify BE disease at greater risk of progression to EAC. ML may help to better manage BE in early histological stages and when histology alone provides insufficient information.

Quality in EUS: an assessment of baseline compliance and performance improvement by using the American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy-American College of Gastroenterology quality indicators.

BACKGROUND: An American Society for Gastrointestinal Endoscopy-American College of Gastroenterology (ASGE-ACG) task force recently developed quality indicators for the preprocedure, intraprocedure, and postprocedure phases of each endoscopic procedure. Benchmark rates and clinical significance of compliance have not been determined. OBJECTIVES: To establish baseline compliance rates to the preprocedure and intraprocedure quality indicators in our EUS cases, identify indicators with the lowest compliance rates, and establish change in compliance rates with a targeted performance improvement plan. METHODS: We measured baseline compliance to each of the preprocedure and intraprocedure EUS quality indicators in the EUS procedures performed at Mayo Clinic Jacksonville from March 1996 through August 2006. We developed a performance improvement plan that targeted the 4 indicators with the lowest compliance over the entire time period. Compliance rates in the year after plan implementation were compared with those from January 2004 to August 2006, when adjusting for endoscopist and direct access. RESULTS: We demonstrated areas of high quality as well as areas for improvement in compliance with the ASGE-ACG quality metrics in a large cohort of EUS cases. We achieved improvement in all 4 areas targeted for quality improvement, statistically significant at the 5% level for two of the quality indicators. LIMITATIONS: Limitations included our retrospective design and the use of unstructured procedure dictations that may limit application of our results. It is also unclear whether compliance was truly synonymous with performance. CONCLUSIONS: We established reference levels of compliance rate within our practice and showed that a targeted performance improvement plan that consisted of awareness, individual accountability, and documentation can result in improvement.