A family history of colorectal cancer risk will be taken into account in preventive care in the future

Around 61,300 people in Germany develop bowel cancer every year. About ten percent of the annual new cases affect people under the age of 50. The majority of these cases are due to a familial or hereditary risk.

The Bavarian model project FARKOR has shown that these people should be offered colon cancer screening from the age of 30. On February 23, 2023, the Innovation Committee of the Federal Joint Committee (G-BA) decided on the positive transfer recommendations for FARKOR.

Colorectal cancer is second most common cancer in both men and women.

Colorectal cancer is the second most common type of cancer in both sexes. From the age of 50, the incidence rates increase noticeably. However, a worrying trend has been observed in recent years: an increasing number of young adults under the age of 50 are developing colorectal cancer. According to the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), the increase among 20 to 29-year-olds is particularly striking, with an annual rate of increase of almost eight percent.

Felix Burda also fell ill at a young age, at the age of 31, due to a family risk. He died at the age of 33. It was his wish for his parents, Christa Maar and Hubert Burda, that they set up a foundation in his name that would spare other people his fate. Since the Felix Burda Foundation was founded in 2001, family risk has been at the top of the Munich organization’s agenda. For 22 years, the foundation has been committed to identifying young adults who are at risk – like Felix was then – and to enabling them to take preventive measures in good time to protect them from colon cancer.

The chronology of success – FARKOR as Christa Maar’s last legacy

When the focus of the first funding wave of the newly created innovation fund was published in February 2016 Christa But launched a pilot project in spring 2016 to sustainably improve the situation of families with an increased risk of colorectal cancer. Under the title “FARKOR – Prevention at familiar belt Risiko for that islorectal carcinoma” finally started this model project in October 2017 in Bavaria. It was funded by the innovation fund with over eleven million euros and, under the leadership of the consortium leader, the Bavarian Association of Statutory Health Insurance Physicians (KVB), collected data from Bavarian doctors and health insurance companies until 2021. The results were presented in July 2022 and the final report submitted to the Innovation Committee of the G-BA.

Now – for colon cancer month March 2023 – the breakthrough has been achieved! The FARKOR model project provided the decisive data on the basis of which the G-BA made a positive decision on February 23, 2023: FARKOR is transferred to standard care.

The familial risk no longer remains undetected and people with this increased risk have a legal right to life-saving colon cancer screening.

Christa Maar, the director of the Felix Burda Foundation and President of the Network Against Colon Cancer eV, who died in November 2022, can posthumously record another success of her decades-long commitment against colon cancer.

“My son Felix was diagnosed with colon cancer at the age of 31. He survived this diagnosis only two years. This project could have saved his life“, so Christa Maar at a press conference in 2019. „If Felix had found out about his family risk at a young age by taking his family history from the doctor and then had a colonoscopy, pre-cancerous lesions that were already present would have been identified and removed, and the development of fatal cancer would probably have been avoided.”

With FARKOR, Christa Maar was able to evaluate a process that protects young people like her son from colon cancer. The introduction of FARKOR into standard care will remain her final legacy.

FARKOR – Prevention in family risk of colorectal carcinoma

For the early detection of colorectal cancer, those with statutory health insurance can take a test for blood in the stool (iFOBT) from the age of 50 or a colonoscopy for men and women from the age of 55 for a colonoscopy. However, there is no screening for younger people with a family history of increased risk of colon cancer. The FARKOR project tested various access routes to identify people with a family history of increased risk of colorectal cancer in order to be able to offer them an iFOBT or a colonoscopy as an early detection test. In addition, detection rates and the distribution of stages of colorectal cancer were collected from the people examined and linked to routine data. It was also possible to make a statement on the frequency of participation and influencing factors.

The knowledge gained in the project will be forwarded to the sub-committee on method evaluation of the Federal Joint Committee, among others. He is asked to examine how the findings can be incorporated into the revision of the guidelines for organized cancer screening programs (oKFE-RL) and the guidelines for the early detection of cancer (KFE-RL).

Note: The Felix Burda Foundation, like FOCUS Online, belongs to Hubert Burda Media.