About Bowel Cancer

"How did I not take this matter to heart, regret it ......"

Ms. Kelly, 43, had a colonoscopy 3 years ago because she always had diarrhea, and found several sigmoid polyps, which were removed by endoscopy on the spot.

The pathology confirmed that Ms. Kelly's polyps were villous adenomas, which are prone to recurrence and carcinogenesis.

However, since Ms. Kelly did not have any symptoms after surgery and felt that it was time-consuming to go to the hospital, she forgot about the doctor's instructions and did not have a checkup for 3 years after the polyps were removed.

In February, Ms. Kelly had blood in her stool, and because it occurred intermittently, she initially thought it was a fire and did not specifically seek medical advice.

It was only recently, when blood in stool became frequent and darkened with pus, that Ms. Kelly went to the hospital again, and the results showed: intermediate to advanced sigmoid colon cancer.

01 Bowel cancer is mostly polyps when it is a child

Bowel cancer is a very common malignant tumor, ranking among the top five in the global malignant tumor incidence spectrum, with 20-30 new cases per 100,000 people every year.

And according to statistics, 80%-95% of colorectal cancers are transformed from intestinal polyps, and the deterioration pathway is often from small polyps - adenoma - high-grade neoplasia - colorectal cancer.

However, not all polyps are cancerous. Colorectal polyps are classified by nature into, inflammatory polyps and adenomatous polyps. Inflammatory polyps are caused by proliferative inflammation of the intestine and are benign polyps with little chance of malignant transformation. Adenomatous polyps, on the other hand, have complex growth factors and tend to have a higher chance of becoming cancerous.

There are three types of adenomatous polyps: tubular adenoma, villous adenoma, and mixed adenoma, among which, the cancer rate of villous adenoma is the highest, more than 10 times higher than that of tubular adenoma, and the cancer rate of tubular adenoma is the lowest.

How can "small bumps" grow in the intestine for no reason? Most of the causes of polyps are related to our life, but we do not pay more attention to them, such as long-term consumption of high-protein, high-fat food, repeated stimulation of inflammation, long-term constipation, genetic factors, etc., may stimulate the formation of polyps in the intestine.

It can be seen that if intestinal polyps are not detected in time, it will be more difficult to prevent intestinal cancer.

02 Cancer in the body, these 4 symptoms are the alarm

Unfortunately, in 80% of bowel cancer patients, without an active colonoscopy, are hard to find out the body abnormalities. Therefore, when the following conditions appear in the body, it is likely to suggest that colorectal cancer has come, and should go to the hospital for consultation in time.

1. Abdominal pain and abdominal mass

Some patients with colorectal cancer will have frequent abdominal pain and abdominal distension in the early stage, specifically a burst of abdominal pain, but with the gas discharge, the abdominal cramps will disappear again, and some patients will feel a hard lump in the abdomen.

2. Anemia and weakness

The growth of tumor cells needs a lot of nutrition. As the cancer cells grow bigger and bigger, the normal cells are deprived of nutrition, so people will have different degrees of anemia, and also have symptoms such as weakness and fatigue.

3. Abnormal stool

The frequency, shape, and time of stool are different from previous bowel habits, for example, one bowel movement a day before, but now it is three or four times a day, or only once every two or three days, with alternating diarrhea; severe deformation of stool, difficult to form and mucus stool; feeling relaxed after defecation before, but now there is always a feeling of incomplete defecation, etc.

4. Blood in stool

Blood in the stool is one of the most typical and common manifestations of rectal cancer in the early stage, but many people will confuse blood in the stool of bowel cancer with blood in the stool of hemorrhoids. Blood in the stool of bowel cancer is usually dark in color and mostly mixed with stool in a berry color, dark red and tar-like.

03 Bowel cancer is silly

Although the early symptoms of bowel cancer are not obvious and easy to be missed, it takes 5-15 years to develop slowly from polyp to cancer and has a high cure rate when detected at an early stage, so it is also called "silly cancer".

Therefore, the potential risk of cancer can be greatly reduced by having a colonoscopy.

Through colonoscopy, doctors can see and remove polyps that have cancerous potential with the help of equipment.

Colonoscopy is not only limited to the discovery of polyps, it is the "gold standard" for colorectal cancer and can also help diagnose more than 40 kinds of diseases such as enteritis, intestinal tuberculosis, adenoma, etc. During a colonoscopy, doctors can also obtain small pieces of tissue with biopsy forceps to characterize the lesions.

This is why you often hear that "a colonoscopy can take care of you for five or ten years".

Many people resist when they hear about colonoscopy. Colonoscopy is divided into general colonoscopy and painless colonoscopy, how to choose?

Painless colonoscopy has an additional process of general anesthesia, before the colonoscopy, the first will be injected with anesthetic drugs so that the examiner goes to sleep, the whole process, the patient does not have any pain. However, there are risks for patients with chronic diseases and elderly people who are under general anesthesia, and they need to be evaluated before they can determine whether they are suitable for painless colonoscopy.

People with a family history of colorectal cancer, inflammatory bowel disease, diabetes, frequent intake of red meat and processed meat, obese people, and those who like to smoke and drink alcohol are all high-risk groups for bowel cancer and must undergo regular colonoscopy for early detection of intestinal problems and timely intervention.

Of course, besides awareness of screening, the occurrence of colorectal cancer cannot be separated from the improvement of the daily diet. Eating more vegetables and fruits, less meat, regular work and rest, and more exercise are the best measures to prevent cancer.