Felix Burda Award: fighters against cancer

Christiane Fux studied journalism and psychology in Hamburg. The experienced medical editor has been writing magazine articles, news and factual texts on all conceivable health topics since 2001. In addition to her work for, Christiane Fux is also active in prose. Her first crime novel was published in 2012, and she also writes, designs and publishes her own crime plays.

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Colon cancer is a disease that can be recognized very early and even prevented. The winners of this year's Felix Burda Awards contributed to this.

Three prizes, three committed people and projects: The Felix Burda Award honors outstanding work against colon cancer again this year.

App for cancer patients

The Ehrenfelix 2021 goes to Susanna Zsoter. The 28-year-old, suffering from colon cancer, blogs as a “cancer warrior” on Facebook and Instagram, provides information in the media and at prevention events. It explains that cancer can affect anyone at any age. "People should take precautionary measures so that shit doesn't happen to them like me," says Zsoster.

So that people suffering from cancer can better manage their illness and the challenges associated with it, she is currently developing the patient app “MONK-Meine Onkologie” together with the Erlangen association “Health Hackers”. Fundraising is currently in progress. The app aims to enable patients to “better manage” their condition so they can focus more on their recovery.

“When it comes to something life-threatening like your own cancer, we don't have any holistic solutions, just a patchwork of digital islands and mountains of analog paper. That is an intolerable condition! ”Said the Ehrenfelix award winner.

Blood test for colon cancer

The Swiss biotechnology company Novigenix received an award in the “Medicine & Science” category. The scientists have further developed a molecular blood test for the prevention and early detection of colon cancer, with which 80 percent of all colon cancer can be detected.

Laudator Dr. Berndt Birkner explains: “Like other human tumors, colon cancer triggers a cellular immune response in the rows of white blood cells in the bone marrow. These white blood cells leave traces in the blood, so to speak ”. These can be detected with a PCR test.

The advantage of the method is the low inhibition threshold: even taking a sample for a test for blood in the stool is a deterrent for many people. And the colonoscopy, which is still the safest method not only to detect colon cancer but also to remove precursors, is still too few people make use of. A blood test, on the other hand, could be done as part of common blood draws.

"Engagement of the year"

"50 years on the lid? Comma to prevention! ”- with this call-to-action in the Rhenish dialect, the colon cancer prevention campaign in Moers started in March 2019. Christoph Fleischhauer, Mayor of Moers, and Dr. Ralf Engels, Ralf Nennhaus and Dr. Jochen Purrmann were honored for their municipal campaign to promote colonoscopies. The alliance of politics and doctors has paid off. The place drew my attention to the topic of colon cancer prevention with poster campaigns, events and bus stickers.

Over 1100 additional colonoscopies were generated by the campaign compared to the same period in 2018. Statistically, “Darmgesund in Moers” was able to save around 40 people from colon cancer.

Colon cancer numbers could be halved

In her opening speech, Christa Maar, CEO of the Felix Burda Foundation, points out that efforts to improve colon cancer prevention are having an effect: the death rate from colon cancer has fallen significantly in Germany in recent years. For men by 36 percent, for women by 40 percent.

“But it is also true that around 61,000 people are still diagnosed with colon cancer every year and more than 24,000 die from it. According to the German Cancer Research Center, these numbers could be halved within the next ten years, ”said Maar. The prerequisite is that significantly more people than before take advantage of the colorectal cancer screening program!

This can be achieved through a low-threshold personal invitation to colon cancer screening. For this purpose, the invitation procedure itself, as well as the accompanying information material, should be redesigned in such a way that it takes into account the reality of life and the sometimes limited health literacy of people.

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