The most exciting development this year in the field of cancer in inflammatory bowel disease has been the use of flow cytometry to define genetic abnormalities in colonic biopsy specimens in patients with Crohn's colitis or ulcerative colitis. In the future, it appears that DNA aneuploidy will replace mucosal dysplasia as the best marker for identifying the patient at extremely high risk for developing cancer. Work continues, though, on confirming and identifying risk factors for cancer in ulcerative colitis patients and on further defining parameters for cancer surveillance that use mucosal dysplasia as the criterion for a positive screening test. Crohn's disease patients may be at increased risk for intestinal and extraintestinal cancer as judged by a flurry of such reports this year. The evidence for an increased risk of extraintestinal cancer in inflammatory bowel disease, though, is slim.