BEATING BOWEL CANCER – WHY TEST?
Bowel cancer is the fourth commonest cause of cancer in UK men and women with over 40,000 new cases each year and around 17,000 deaths.
But, bowel cancer is one of the easiest cancers to prevent. In fact over half of the cases we see, never needed to happen.
Why is that? Bowel cancer often starts from a small benign polyp (non-cancerous growth) in the bowel. As it grows bigger, however, there is a risk of it becoming cancerous. It may still be a very early and curable cancer…but if left to grow it can invade through the wall of the bowel into surrounding tissues or spread to distant sites such as the liver. Treatment is then more difficult, and cure still possible but not guaranteed.
The problem is, we may not be aware that we have a polyp unless it causes obvious bleeding. A lot of the time, though, it may only cause a tiny amount of blood to pass unnoticed in our poo when we use the toilet. It’s only when the polyp becomes much larger and starts to become cancerous and cause narrowing of our bowel that we may notice symptoms of pain, change in our toilet habits or consistency of our poo.
So ideally, we want to pick it up much earlier.
Luckily, we now have a very sensitive and easy-to-use test that anyone can do at home. It’s called a qFIT test and just requires you to put squeamishness to one side for a few minutes and take a tiny sample of your poo, that can be analysed in a lab for traces of blood. It’s well worth it, if it can detect a cancer before it even happens.
It is a very sensitive test, picking up a large number of polyps and cancers.
A positive test doesn’t necessarily mean you have cancer – or even a precancerous polyp – as other problems can cause bleeding in the bowel. But it’s an indication that you need a proper check, and if needed, removal of any polyps before they cause any problems.
A negative test is a strong reassurance that you have nothing to worry about, though no test is fully reliable and any ongoing problems need to be checked out.
How do I get a qFIT test?
In the UK, you will automatically receive a bowel cancer screening qFIT test every 2 years if you're aged between 50 and 74 years, depending on where you live. This aims to reduce the chances of polyps causing cancer in the most at-risk age group. However, whilst colorectal cancer rates have dropped or remained stable in many age groups, the rates in 25-49s have increased by 48%, since the early 1990s.
So, if you receive a poo test in the post, please do take the opportunity to check your bowel out – it may save you a lot of stress and trouble later on.
But you may also want to consider investing in testing at an earlier age, and perhaps more frequently than the two-yearly free tests on offer. Taking on a yearly subscription with B-Assured means you don't have to remember - there is enough to think about as it is. We can make sure that your check up happens regularly, with minimal effort on your part, and an awful lot to gain.
Of course, you can also help reduce your risk by taking more care of your gut with higher fibre, lower sugar and less processed foods, which will help your health in many other ways too.
Cancer Research UK
NICE – NHS Bowel Cancer Screening Programme UK
