Taking a page from his CBS News colleague Katie Couric, CBS “Early Show” co-anchor Harry Smith will undergo a colonoscopy live on Wednesday’s show. Couric will be with Smith as he preps for and undergoes the procedure.

Following Couric’s on-air colonoscopy on the Today show in 2000, University of Michigan researchers documented a 20% increase in the number of colonoscopies performed across the country, dubbing it “The Couric Effect.” Couric’s husband Jay Monahan died of colon cancer in January 1998. In 2004, Couric opened the Jay Monahan Center at New York-Presbyterian Hospital / Weill Medical College of Cornell University, where Smith will undergo his procedure.

And it’s not even sweeps…