In addition, for the diagnostic discrimination between CRC and benign lesions, the pooled sensitivity, specificity and AUC of methylated SFRP2 were 0.71 (95 CI %: 0.55–0.83), 0.63 (95 CI %: 0.55–0.70) and 0.69 (95 CI %: 0.65–0.73) in feces samples (Fig. 9), which demonstrated that the use of methylated SFRP2 as a biomarker could not accurately distinguish CRC and benign lesions. This evidence concerns the gene SFRP2 and colorectal carcinoma.