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Is this the right place for my GI procedure? Ask Oprah!

Oprah Winfrey advises of the 6 most important questions to ask if you are having a procedure at an out of hospital facility. See the article at Oprah.com here. This is not an endorsement by Oprah, these are answers from our facility to the questions she recommends you ask. Wherever you have your procedure, ask

We will perform on-site COVID testing before every procedure

When we resume endoscopy services, we will screen all patients for COVID-19 at a separate, on-site visit right here in our office. The test will be administered by nursing personnel from Mobile Anesthesia of Chicago and billed directly through LabCorp. You do not need to go to the hospital (and potentially be exposed to high

Cancer Risk Lower When Docs Are Better at Adenoma Detection

A retrospective study of three large health systems found that the risk for colorectal cancer following a colonoscopy was lower when the colonoscopy was conducted by a physician with higher adenoma detection rates (ADR’s). Adenomas are the usual precursor type polyps that can lead to colon cancer. At the Endoscopy Center of the North Shore,

De-Escalation of PPI Therapy

The American Gastroenterological Association has released a new Clinical Practice Update providing best practice advice on how to approach de-prescribing proton pump inhibitors (PPI) in ambulatory patients. See the AGA website information here.

Microbiome therapeutic shows promise in recurrent C. difficile

CP101, an investigational microbiome therapeutic, restored microbiome diversity and prompted a sustained clinical cure among patients with recurrent Clostridioides difficile infection, according to a presentation at this year’s ACG in Las Vegas. “(The c. dif) therapies lead to significant microbiome disruptions which impairs colonization resistance,” Jessica R. Allegretti, MD, MPH, FACG, the director of fecal

Sugary drinks tied to early colon cancer

According to study results of 95,464 women published in Gut, there were 109 incident early-onset cancer cases over up to 24-years of follow-up. Compared with women who consumed less than one serving per week of sugary drinks, women who consumed more than two servings per day of had a 2.2-fold higher risk for early-onset colon

Noncompliance with colonoscopy increases risk

Patients who did not have a colonoscopy as recommended after a positive fecal occult blood test had a 103% higher risk of death, compared with those who had a colonoscopy. The cumulative mortality for CRC was 6.8 per 1,000 (95% CI, 5.9-7.6) for compliant patients and 16 per 1,000 (95% CI, 13.1-18.9) for noncompliant patients

Depression with GI symptoms may mean IBD

It has long been recognized that depression can lead to GI symptoms. But do all GI symptoms in the setting of depression mean only depression? A recent study by Jonathan Blackwell et al at St George’s University of London found that depression, in the absence of prior GI symptoms, is not associated with subsequent development

Excerpts from a chat on colon cancer

Seth (Chicago) – 12:47 PM:Are there any downsides to screening? Can it do more harm than good in any instances? Dr. Manoj Mehta Any screening test is only worth its trade-offs. That’s why we select the patients, and do not just do it on everyone. We call the threshold a “pre-test probability”. So, if you

Excerpts from a chat on colon cancer

Jose (Chicago, Illinois) – 12:40 PM:Is surgery the only way to cure colon cancer? Dr. Manoj Mehta Well, the transition from polyp to cancer is a gradual one, so we do sometimes see what we call “cancerous polyps”. They are on the edge between a polyp and an invasive cancer. By removing these polyps, we