BJGP Interviews podcast

Faecal calprotectin in the over-50s: Rule-out test or red flag?

11/11/2025
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Today, we’re speaking to Dr Rob Perry, who is a Gastroenterology Clinical Research Fellow based at Imperial College London.

Title of paper: Evaluating the Role of Faecal Calprotectin in Older Adults

Available at: https://doi.org/10.3399/BJGP.2025.0169

There is considerable uncertainty surrounding the use of FC as a diagnostic test in older adults, with varying suggestions in guidelines and a lack of data in the wider literature. This study investigates the performance of FC in older adults (≥50 years), compared to a younger cohort, with a view to guide its correct use in a primary care setting. These data suggest that FC is a sensitive test for IBD and organic gastrointestinal pathology in both groups. However, concerns remain over its PPV and specificity, particularly in older adults, and it should not be used if colorectal cancer is suspected.

Transcript

This transcript was generated using AI and has not been reviewed for accuracy. Please be aware it may contain errors or omissions.


Speaker A

00:00:00.880 - 00:00:49.180

Hello and welcome to BJGP Interviews. I'm Nada Khan and I'm one of the Associate Editors of the bjgp. Thanks for taking the time today to listen to this podcast. Today we're speaking to Dr.


Rob Perry, who is a gastroenterology Clinical Research Fellow based at Imperial College London. We're here to talk about the paper he's recently published here in the BJGP titled Evaluating the Role of Fecal Calprotectin in Older Adults.


So thanks, Rob, for joining me here to talk about your work.


And I guess I just really want to preface this by saying that a lot has changed in the last few years just in terms of testing for inflammatory bowel disease and bowel cancer in general practice. But I wonder if you could just talk us through this, some of the different guidelines and why you wanted to do this study.


Speaker B

00:00:49.660 - 00:02:24.450

Oh, yes, thank you for having me.


Firstly, and the rationale for the study is that, you know, consultations for gastrointestinal symptoms make up a large number of consultations in primary care. I think the figures around 10%.


And whilst fecal cow protection is an increasingly well established test for differentiating between inflammatory bowel disease and functional or other gastrointestinal or non inflammatory gastrointestinal diseases, its role in older adults is far less well established.


With varying guidelines for clinicians in primary care, the NICE guidelines make no specific mention, for example, of age, other than that calprotectin should not be used where age is considered a risk factor in the context of certain symptoms. For suspicion of cancer, the BSG guidelines on IBD use a cutoff of 40, above which they suggest calprotectin is not used.


The something called the NICE York Fecal cow protectant care pathway suggests an age cut above 60, which is a NICE endorsed pathway. So there's some uncertainty there in the literature about which cutoff should be used for fecal cow protectin.


And the reason any cutoff is suggested is because data has previously shown that calprotectin lacks sensitivity for diagnosing colorectal cancer.


And as age is considered a risk factor for colorectal cancer, guidelines normally mandate earlier endoscopic evaluation of patients with GI symptoms in older age groups.


Speaker A

00:02:24.530 - 00:02:39.170

And can you just talk us through briefly what you did here? So you looked at patients referred for a colonoscopy at one single centre, so at Imperial College Healthcare Trust.


But just talk us through...

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