Difficult colonoscopy score identifies the difficult patients undergoing unsedated colonoscopy

BACKGROUND Many factors have been found to affect the difficulty of colonoscope insertion, such as age, gender, body mass index (BMI), history of abdominal surgery and operator etc. However, a scoring system may be more useful to predict the difficulty during colonoscopy. METHODS The individual and procedure-related data of 616 patients undergoing colonoscopy were prospectively collected from December 2013 through February 2014 in Xijing Hospital of Digestive Diseases. Cox regression analysis was used to identify high-risk factors associated with difficulty of colonoscopy. A predicting model with the difficult colonoscopy score (DCS) was developed. RESULTS Total cecum intubation rate was 98.9% (609/616). Advanced age, lower BMI, inexperienced operator and fair or poor sleep quality were identified as independent factors of prolonged insertion time (all p < 0.05), which were used to develop the DCS. Based on the score, patients could be divided into high-risk and low-risk groups with distinct incomplete rates within 10 min (42.0% vs. 16.5%, p < 0.001). Compared with those with DCS ≤ 1, patients with DCS > 1 had increased insertion time (10.6 ± 0.7 min vs. 6.9 ± 0.2 min, p < 0.001) and pain score (1.9 ± 1.5 vs. 1.4 ± 1.4, p = 0.002). More abdominal compression (36.9% vs. 16.8%, p < 0.001) and position change (51.4% vs. 22.6%, p < 0.001) were needed in this group of patients. CONCLUSION Patients with DCS > 1 had longer insertion time, higher pain score and needed more abdominal compression and position changes. DCS was useful for predicting the difficulty of colonoscope intubation. (ClinicalTrials.gov NCT02105025 05/05/2014).