ACG Annual Scientific Meeting 2026 Recap: 7 Trials to Know

Thousands of gastroenterologists, hepatologists, advanced practice providers, and trainees gathered at the Music City Center in Nashville, Tennessee, October 9-14 for the American College of Gastroenterology (ACG) 2026 Annual Scientific Meeting and Postgraduate Course, which featured 12 scientific symposia, more than 70 oral abstract presentations, and thousands of posters spanning gastroenterology, hepatology, and endoscopy.

Featured lectures ranged from humanistic medicine in an AI-driven world and metabolic dysfunction-associated steatohepatitis (MASH) to the Rome V criteria and advanced endoscopy. Colorectal cancer (CRC) prevention was a recurring theme, anchored by the Emily Couric Memorial Lecture.

Dedicated plenary sessions on CRC prevention, inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), and the esophagus, along with late-breaking abstract sessions, addressed long-standing gaps in care. These ranged from limited oral and pediatric options in ulcerative colitis (UC) to the many eligible patients who never complete screening.

Below, HCPLive highlights 7 trials from the meeting clinicians should know, spanning interleukin (IL)-23 pathway therapies, infliximab delivery, fecal immunochemical test (FIT) performance, blood-based screening, eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE), and Barrett’s esophagus (BE).

Oral Icotrokinra Sustains UC Response Through 76 Weeks in ANTHEM-UC LTE

ANTHEM-UC long-term extension (LTE) data show once-daily oral icotrokinra maintained clinical efficacy with no new safety signals for approximately 1.5 years in adults with moderately to severely active UC. Results showed most of the 136 icotrokinra-treated participants entering the extension achieved clinical response, clinical remission, and endoscopic improvement at week 76, and 87% remained on treatment through week 78.

Mirikizumab Shows Early Efficacy in Pediatric UC in SHINE-2 Trial

Week 12 data from the phase 3 SHINE-2 study highlight early clinical, endoscopic, and symptomatic improvements in children and adolescents with moderately to severely active UC following mirikizumab induction. At week 12, 41.3% of participants aged 2 to 17 years achieved clinical remission, and 81.0% achieved clinical response.

Subcutaneous Infliximab Outperforms IV in Ileal Crohn’s Disease Analysis

Subcutaneous (SC) infliximab was associated with higher rates of clinical remission and better endoscopic outcomes than intravenous (IV) infliximab in patients with ileum-involved Crohn’s disease (CD), according to a pooled, propensity score-matched analysis of 4 registrational trials, including LIBERTY-CD, PLANETCD, and a pair of phase 1 studies of SC infliximab. In the matched population, 65.7% of patients receiving SC infliximab achieved endoscopic response at week 54, compared with 27.1% of those receiving IV infliximab.

FIT Misses More CRCs in Women; Could Sex-Specific Thresholds Help?

Fecal immunochemical test (FIT) sensitivity for colorectal cancer (CRC) and advanced precancerous lesions (APLs) was lower in women than in men at the standard 100 ng/mL positivity threshold, according to findings from an analysis of > 30,000 screening participants. Results showed FIT detected 62.0% of colorectal cancers in women vs 77.4% in men, with proximal tumors driving much of the gap.

Updated SimpleScreen CRC Blood Test Improves Precancerous Lesion Detection

An updated version of the SimpleScreen CRC blood test detected APLs with 18.2% sensitivity, up from 13.7% with the previous version, while maintaining 80.4% sensitivity for CRC in a new clinical validation study. The test, developed by Freenome, received US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval based on the PREEMPT CRC study. In that study, the original test achieved 79.2% CRC sensitivity, but its APL sensitivity missed the prespecified acceptance criterion.

Tezepelumab Meets Co-Primary End Points in Phase 3 CROSSING Trial in EoE

Tezepelumab, an antibody targeting thymic stromal lymphopoietin (TSLP), significantly improved histologic remission and dysphagia symptoms versus placebo in adults and adolescents with eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE) in the phase 3 CROSSING trial. At week 24, histologic remission was achieved by 64.8% of patients receiving tezepelumab 210 mg and 68.9% receiving 420 mg, compared with 3.5% receiving placebo.

DETECT-ME: Swallowable Sponge Test for Barrett’s Esophagus Screening

A swallowable capsule-sponge device paired with a DNA methylation biomarker panel detected Barrett’s esophagus (BE) with 90% sensitivity and 86% specificity in the prospective, multicenter DETECT-ME study. Results showed the overall sensitivity was 90% (163/181; 95% CI, 84%-94%), and specificity was 86% (123/143; 95% CI, 79%-91%).