FRIDAY, May 11 (HealthDay News) -- The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists is launching an education campaign designed to reduce death rates from colorectal cancer among women, officials announced this week at the organization's annual clinical meeting in San Diego.
Among American women, only lung and breast cancers cause more cancer deaths among women. In fact, colorectal cancer kills nearly as many women each year as ovarian, cervical and uterine cancers combined, according to ACOG president Douglas W. Laube, M.D.
Yet colorectal cancer has a significantly lower profile than some other kinds of cancer. Laube urged ob-gyns to emphasize the importance of colorectal cancer screening when they talk to their patients.
"This initiative is about reaching out to women with an important life-saving message: Colorectal cancer is preventable, it's treatable and it's beatable," Laube said in a statement. "This is an extremely vital theme because the benefits of colorectal cancer screening are not fully understood."
About nine out of 10 people with colorectal cancer are older than 50, and annual screening should begin for most women at that age. Women at higher risk should begin screening even earlier.
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