[An early diagnosis of colorectal cancer]

Colorectal cancer is still a huge challenge for modern oncology due to a number of patients. The malignant disease is associated with industrial countries and mostly occurs in Europe and United States. Despite screening programs there are a constant number of 30% patients who have advanced colorectal cancer that is clinically relevant. On the other hand, a body of evidence is accumulating on the molecular mechanisms that play a pivotal role in development of sporadic and hereditary kind of colorectal cancers. In this review we presented molecular mechanisms involved in development of colorectal cancer. Moreover, we described the results of screening programs used to detect an early stage of colorectal cancer and modern molecular techniques useful at the time of detection micrometastatic disease involving lymph nodes and bone marrow.