Colon Explorer – Welcome
Colon Explorer
Colon Explorer is a website dedicated to diagnostic and therapeutic colonoscopy, realized and fostered by two expert colonoscopists, aimed at collecting contributions, opinions, diagnostic and educational material from national and international colleagues.
The creation of a source of images, videos, presentations, clinical cases, and diagnostic and therapeutic procedures has the objective to boost the interest of dedicated endoscopist, ease the interchange of opinions, and support teaching and spread of colonic exploration techniques.
The website is structured into three main sections: a) Educational, illustrating the various modalities of intubation and exploration of the colon; b) Diagnostic, collecting images, videos and clinical cases inherent to colorectal diseases; and c) Therapeutic, offering images and videos concerning the most advanced operative procedures to remove colorectal neoplastic lesions. An accessory section is dedicated to proctologic diseases, conditions often unfamiliar to Gastroenterologists.
Given the complexity of the subject, the website is launched in a provisional modality, with the aim of collecting suggestions and contributions from other colleagues, and will constantly be updated and enriched, always open to anyone who would like to contribute his/her experience.
Bologna, Roma – September 2013
Giuseppe Gizzi & Lucio Petruzziello
News
Scarica Materiale Didattico II Edizione Masterclass in Colonscopy
New Update
Added new presentation to the Diagnostic Section - Presentation
New Update
Added new presentation to the Operative Section - Presentazione
New Update
New endoscopic training tutorial available: NICE classification, Pit Patter, Identification and classification of Serrated lesions, Depressed-type lesions and Laterally Spreading Tumors (LST)
Mission
Colonoscopy was introduced in the clinical practice some 50 years ago, in 1963, a few years after the development of the fiber optic scope by Basil Hirschowitz. Technologic improvements have since been uninterrupted and today colonoscopy is definitely the “gold standard” procedure to explore the entire large bowel.
In the last decade, particularly, technologic progress has enormously improved the diagnostic as well as educational potential of colonic endoscopy, both as a diagnostic and powerful therapeutic tool. This has heavily influenced the approach of Gastroenterologists, Internists and Surgeons alike toward colorectal diseases.
The most recent colonoscopes simplify the intubation of the colon up to the cecum, with significantly less discomfort to the patient; the high quality of the endoscopic images allows careful assessment of the whole picture and also the most subtle details of pre-neoplastic and neoplastic lesions. Such distinctive features enable the endoscopist to discriminate those lesions amenable to endoscopic resection from those who need to be removed surgically. Besides, the possibility to capture and store high-definition images and videos facilitates the creation of media archives, the widespread availability, sharing and interchange of experiences with other colleagues and the scientific community.
Nonetheless, colonoscopy, particularly in terms of intubation technique, still represents a major challenge; the colonoscope is like the Ariadne’s thread and the colon is its labyrinth.
As Jerome Waye and Christopher Williams wrote more than 10 years ago, colonoscopy should be considered not only as a part of a medical discipline, but rather as a burning passion that pools those endoscopists interested in it. Each and every new examination sets the opportunity to refine the technique, assimilate new schemes of performing the procedure, increase clinical knowledge, and ultimately appreciate the acquisition of his/her own improvements