Incorporating CT Colonography into Radiology Practice

The statistics on colon cancer continue to be troubling. Colorectal cancer (CTC) is reportedly the third leading cause of death among African Americans, and there has been an increasing incidence of CTC among people under the age of 50.^1,2 In a recently published study in JAMA Network Open, researchers noted increasing annual incidence rates of colorectal adenocarcinoma among people 15 to 50 years of age.²

In a recent interview. Syam Reddy, M.D., discussed these trends and lamented that screening is only being done for approximately 60 percent of those at risk for colon cancer.

“Our screening efforts need to expand. And to do that, we just need to have more opportunities that people have available for screening. That's what makes CT colonography such an ideal exam for these screening tools. You know, some of the tools out there, they screen for cancer, but not for pre-cancerous lesions. That's a huge advantage for CT colonography as well as the optical colonoscopy. Both of those are pretty equivalent when it comes to cancer detection or pre-cancer detection,” maintained Dr. Reddy, the clinical chairman at the UChicago Medicine Ingalls Memorial Hospital in Harvey, Ill.

With this in mind, Dr. Reddy recently developed a clinical pathway with Radiology Partners for incorporating CTC into radiology practice. Dr. Reddy describes it as a resource that compiles available information on CTC for technologists, radiologists, patients, and administrators.

“The reason for doing that is we really wanted to, in this crazy, busy world, allow for some kind of resource for our radiologists to be able to pick this up and share it with their local sites, because it's such an important way to help our population on a bigger scale,” explained Dr. Reddy, who is affiliated with Radiology Partners, and is the current president of the Chicago Radiological Society.

(Editor’s note: For related content, see “Could Lymph Node Distribution Patterns on CT Improve Staging for Colon Cancer?,” “Survey Results Reveal Doubling of CT Colonography Use During COVID-19 Pandemic” and “Study: Deep Learning Reconstruction Reduces Effective Dosing for CT Colonography by 83 Percent.”)

For more insights from Dr. Reddy, watch the video below.

References

1. Saka AH, Giaquinto AN, McCullough LE, et al. Cancer statistics for African American and Black people. 2025. CA: a Cancer Journal for Clinicians. https://doi.org/10.3322/caac.21874. Published February 20, 2025. Accessed April 21, 2025.

2. Bussetty A, Shen J, Benias PC, Ma M, Stewart M, Trindade J. Incidence of pancreas and colorectal adenocarcinoma in the U.S. JAMA Netw Open. 2025:8(4):e254682. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.4682 .