Profiles of circulating inflammatory cytokines in colorectal cancer (CRC), high cancer risk conditions, and health are distinct. Possible implications for CRC screening and surveillance

• Health, high CRC risk conditions and CRC differ by their inflammatory profiles.
• Already early CRC is accompanied by systemic inflammation; exacerbating during CRC progression.
• Multicytokine panels are superior to individual cytokines as potential CRC biomarkers.

Alternate colorectal cancer (CRC) screening and surveillance strategies are needed to pre-select candidates for invasive methods. We compared systemic inflammatory profiles in CRC (n = 99), health (n = 98), high CRC-risk conditions (n = 48) and overt inflammation (n = 69) by multiplexed analysis of IL-1β, IL-6, IL-8, FGF-2, G-CSF, GM-CSF, MCP-1, MIP-1α, TNF-α, VEGF-A, and PDGF-B and CEA. Cytokines corresponded with CRC advancement. FGF2, GM-CSF, IL-1β, IL-6, MIP-1α, PDGF-BB, TNF-α, and VEGF-A were higher than in controls already in stage I CRC with FGF2, IL1-β, and MIP-1α higher than in high CRC-risk individuals as well. Cytokine panels devised to differentiate early CRC from controls, adenomas, or inflammatory bowel disease patients (IBD) had good accuracy but only IBD panel had promising specificity at 95% sensitivity.