Colorectal cancer (CRC) remains the second most common cause of cancer-related death in the United States. Although the past several decades have seen significantly greater emphasis on screening and disease prevention for CRC, it has also become increasingly apparent that the age profile and associated risks for this cancer are rapidly changing.
Evidence of this can be found in recently released CRC statistics from the American Cancer Society, which are updated every 3 years using population-based cancer registries.
The incidence in CRC has shown a progressive decline over the past four decades. However, whereas in the 2000s there was an average decline of approximately 3%-4% annually, it slowed to 1% per year between 2011 and 2019. This effect is in part due to the trends among younger individuals (< 55 years), in whom the incidence of CRC has increased by 9% over the past 25 years.