EDITORIAL
As the Thing Is Born
I
t’s an exciting time to be a colorectal surgeon. The last decades have witnessed major advances in the treatment of almost every disease category that afflicts our patients: colorectal cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, anorectal disorders, pelvic floor dysfunction, and benign colorectal conditions. Some of the advances are technical: advanced laparoscopy, robotic surgery, and transanal endoscopic microsurgery are but a few examples. Others depend upon novel medical therapies, such as monoclonal antibody treatment of inflammatory bowel disease and angiogenesis inhibitors for advanced colorectal cancer. And at the heart of much progress lies the expanding body of basic research that fuels many clinical applications. Surgeons are busy people. Try as we might, it is virtually impossible to keep up with the broad array of new literature related to colorectal disease. The problem is difficult enough within the realm of surgery-specific topics. It is harder still if one wants to stay abreast of clinical developments in related fields that directly affect the care of our patients: gastroenterology, radiology, medical oncology and radiation oncology to name just a few. The task of keeping up becomes nearly impossible if one expands one’s scope to basic scientific research. Yes, individual clinicians with specific interests are certainly capable of bridging the gap from bench to bedside. But it is an unreasonable expectation to think that all clinicians will automatically become aware of clinically relevant advances that provide insight and even practical implications for patient care. In this issue of Diseases of the Colon & Rectum, James Church has nicely highlighted one such advance: the recent association of 2 DNA polymerase mutations that are
associated with dominantly inherited colorectal neoplasia.1 The newly described syndrome associated with these mutations, dubbed polymerase proofreading-associated polyposis (PPAP), is of particular importance to clinicians caring for families with heretofore unexplained familial colorectal cancers or for patients with early onset polyposis or cancer who test negative for APC and MYH mutations. Diseases of the Colon & Rectum remains fundamentally a clinical journal, but our mission includes the need to keep our readers abreast of important new developments that will impact their practice. To this end, with this issue we inaugurate a new column: Pro Re Nata, literally ‘as the thing is born.’ Our goal is to alert readers to important developments in basic and translational science with direct clinical relevancy to colorectal disease. We do not intend to review clinical work from related disciplines under this rubric. We don’t expect the column to run frequently, but do invite individuals to submit brief reviews of novel work that has the promise to directly affect the management of colorectal disease in the near term. Potential authors can consider the excellent Church paper to be a perfect model to emulate. REFERENCE 1. Church JM. Polymerase proofreading-associated polyposis: A new, dominantly inherited syndrome of hereditary colorectal cancer predisposition. Dis Colon Rectum. 2014;57:396–397.
Robert D. Madoff, M.D. Editor-in-Chief
Dis Colon Rectum 2014; 57: 283 DOI: 10.1097/DCR.0000000000000086 © The ASCRS 2014 Diseases of the Colon & Rectum Volume 57: 3 (2014)
283
As the Thing Is Born
I
t’s an exciting time to be a colorectal surgeon. The last decades have witnessed major advances in the treatment of almost every disease category that afflicts our patients: colorectal cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, anorectal disorders, pelvic floor dysfunction, and benign colorectal conditions. Some of the advances are technical: advanced laparoscopy, robotic surgery, and transanal endoscopic microsurgery are but a few examples. Others depend upon novel medical therapies, such as monoclonal antibody treatment of inflammatory bowel disease and angiogenesis inhibitors for advanced colorectal cancer. And at the heart of much progress lies the expanding body of basic research that fuels many clinical applications. Surgeons are busy people. Try as we might, it is virtually impossible to keep up with the broad array of new literature related to colorectal disease. The problem is difficult enough within the realm of surgery-specific topics. It is harder still if one wants to stay abreast of clinical developments in related fields that directly affect the care of our patients: gastroenterology, radiology, medical oncology and radiation oncology to name just a few. The task of keeping up becomes nearly impossible if one expands one’s scope to basic scientific research. Yes, individual clinicians with specific interests are certainly capable of bridging the gap from bench to bedside. But it is an unreasonable expectation to think that all clinicians will automatically become aware of clinically relevant advances that provide insight and even practical implications for patient care. In this issue of Diseases of the Colon & Rectum, James Church has nicely highlighted one such advance: the recent association of 2 DNA polymerase mutations that are
associated with dominantly inherited colorectal neoplasia.1 The newly described syndrome associated with these mutations, dubbed polymerase proofreading-associated polyposis (PPAP), is of particular importance to clinicians caring for families with heretofore unexplained familial colorectal cancers or for patients with early onset polyposis or cancer who test negative for APC and MYH mutations. Diseases of the Colon & Rectum remains fundamentally a clinical journal, but our mission includes the need to keep our readers abreast of important new developments that will impact their practice. To this end, with this issue we inaugurate a new column: Pro Re Nata, literally ‘as the thing is born.’ Our goal is to alert readers to important developments in basic and translational science with direct clinical relevancy to colorectal disease. We do not intend to review clinical work from related disciplines under this rubric. We don’t expect the column to run frequently, but do invite individuals to submit brief reviews of novel work that has the promise to directly affect the management of colorectal disease in the near term. Potential authors can consider the excellent Church paper to be a perfect model to emulate. REFERENCE 1. Church JM. Polymerase proofreading-associated polyposis: A new, dominantly inherited syndrome of hereditary colorectal cancer predisposition. Dis Colon Rectum. 2014;57:396–397.
Robert D. Madoff, M.D. Editor-in-Chief
Dis Colon Rectum 2014; 57: 283 DOI: 10.1097/DCR.0000000000000086 © The ASCRS 2014 Diseases of the Colon & Rectum Volume 57: 3 (2014)
283
