Colorectal cancer in patients under 40 years of age.

A retrospective chart review was undertaken on all Hartford Hospital Tumor Registry patients under age 40 with a diagnosed adenocarcinoma of the colon or rectum between the years 1955 and 1980. Of the 45 patients who could be accurately staged by the Dukes classification, only about one-third had disease localized to the bowel. No unique histological pattern was observed. An excess of multiple primary tumors was observed (13%). Stage of disease at the time of presentation, rather than histology, was the most important prognostic factor in this study. Carcinoma of the rectum in our series had a 5-year survival rate of 8%. This group of young patients should be managed with aggressive multimodal therapy.