By the end of this year, more than 55,000 people will die from colorectal cancer.
More than 158,000 will be diagnosed with the disease this year. And once you’re diagnosed, 35% of people will be dead in five years.
Those are scary numbers, but cases in older adults are actually dropping. That’s the good news. But for men under the age of 50, it’s now the leading cause of cancer death and for women under 50, it’s the second leading cause of cancer death.
Why are younger people getting colorectal cancer? That’s the question St. Luke’s Health System is trying to answer with a new study.
Tammie Eslinger is the senior manager, oncology clinical research at the St. Luke's Cancer Institute and she joined Idaho Matters to talk about this research.
