Clinical and endoscopic-pathological characteristics of colorectal polyps: an analysis of 1,234 cases

To analyze the correlation of clinical symptom and endoscopic-pathological characteristics of colorectal polyps.

A retrospective study was performed on 1,234 continuous colorectal polyp patients. Their clinical, colonoscopic and pathological data were collected and analyzed.

In 1,234 patients, 46.0% cases were asymptomatic, and 54.0% cases were symptomatic, and the female to male ratio was 2.23:1 and 1.74:1, respectively (P = 0.048). The mean polyp size in symptomatic group was significantly larger than asymptomatic group [7.6±5.1 mm (95% CI: 7.2, 8.0) vs. 6.3±3.7 mm (95% CI: 6.0, 6.6), P < 0.001]. Tubu-villous polyp and villous polyp occurred more frequently in symptomatic group, compared with asymptomatic group (P = 0.002). In symptomatic group, 37.4% cases complained of abdominal pain and 62.6% cases complained of bowel habit alteration. The polyp number in abdominal pain group was larger than bowel habit alteration group (P = 0.036). Three major symptoms of bowel habit alteration were diarrhea, constipation and hematochezia, with proportion of 54.2% (278/513), 27.7% (142/513) and 18.1% (93/513), respectively. The hematochezia group had larger polyp size than diarrhea group (P = 0.001) and consisted of more villous component than the constipation patients (P = 0.005).

Almost half of colorectal polyp patients do not complain of bowel symptoms, especially the male. Colorectal polyp patients have bowel habit alteration more commonly than abdominal pain. Half of patients with bowel habit alteration demonstrate diarrhea. The hematochezia patients are more susceptible to advanced adenomas than the diarrhea and constipation ones.