New test may spot colon cancer early

Katie Couric, coanchor of NBC’s “Today Show,” has used her high visibility to draw national attention to colorectal cancer— the disease that killed her husband in 1998 but is treatable if caught early. Out of the public eye, scientists have been striving for more-accurate, noninvasive techniques to screen for colorectal cancer.

The most common clinical test looks for blood in a patient’s feces, but this method has notable flaws.