title: Colorectal cancer predicted risk online (CRC-PRO) calculator using data from the multi-ethnic cohort study.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Better risk predictions for colorectal cancer (CRC) could improve prevention strategies by allowing clinicians to more accurately identify high-risk individuals. The National Cancer Institute's CRC risk calculator was created by Freedman et al using case control data.
  
  
  METHODS
  An online risk calculator was created using data from the Multi-Ethnic Cohort Study, which followed >180,000 patients for the development of CRC for up to 11.5 years through linkage with cancer registries. Forward stepwise regression tuned to the c statistic was used to select the most important variables for use in separate Cox survival models for men and women. Model accuracy was assessed using 10-fold cross-validation.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Patients in the cohort experienced 2762 incident cases of CRC. The final model for men contained age, ethnicity, pack-years of smoking, alcoholic drinks per day, body mass index, years of education, regular use of aspirin, family history of colon cancer, regular use of multivitamins, ounces of red meat intake per day, history of diabetes, and hours of moderate physical activity per day. The final model for women included age, ethnicity, years of education, use of estrogen, history of diabetes, pack-years of smoking, family history of colon cancer, regular use of multivitamins, body mass index, regular use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, and alcoholic drinks per day. The calculator demonstrated good accuracy with a cross-validated c statistic of 0.681 in men and 0.679 in women, and it seems to be well calibrated graphically. An electronic version of the calculator is available at http://rcalc.ccf.org.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This calculator seems to be accurate, is user friendly, and has been internally validated in a diverse population.
authors.affiliation: the Department of Quantitative Health Sciences, Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH; University Hospitals Case Medical Center, Cleveland OH; Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Medicine, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH.
authors.forename: Brian J
authors.initials: BJ
authors.lastname: Wells
authors.forename: Michael W
authors.initials: MW
authors.lastname: Kattan
authors.forename: Gregory S
authors.initials: GS
authors.lastname: Cooper
authors.forename: Leila
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Jackson
authors.forename: Siran
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Koroukian
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D015331:Cohort Studies; D015179:Colorectal Neoplasms; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D049451:Nomograms; D009862:Online Systems; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D018570:Risk Assessment / Q000379:methods
keywords: Colorectal Cancer; Medical Decision Making; Prevention and Control; Risk