Doctors told bowel-cancer dad he was suffering from IBS
ADAD who thought he had irritable bowel syndrome was found to have bowel cancer after doctors misdiagnosed him for an entire year.
Richard Sugarman was 35 when he began experiencing chronic pain in his stomach which failed to subside for weeks on end.
He said he was initially told by medics that he had little to worry about as he was so young, with his symptoms being passed off as the common digestive condition IBS.
But after noticing bleeding when he went to the toilet, as well as losing a considerable amount of weight, he wound up in A&E where doctors discovered he had bowel cancer which had spread to his intestine.
“I should not have survived – the cancer had spread to three-quarters of my intestine,” said Richard, from Penarth. “Because I was young at the time, I was told my symptoms weren’t anything serious and were likely to be irritable bowel syndrome.
“I had been misdiagnosed for a year despite having chronic stomach pain. Then I bled when I went to the loo and went to A&E. I was still there for a couple of weeks before I was diagnosed.”
Thankfully, Richard, now 47, only needed surgery to remove the tumour and has now been cancer free for over 10 years. He is now backing a pioneering form of research carried out by Welsh scientists which claims to be able to detect bowel cancer at an earlier stage.
Professor Paul Dyson at Swansea University and Dr Lee Parry at Cardiff University have developed a new test which looks for a safe strain of salmonella in people’s faeces.
This strain is often found in the stools of people who have bowel polyps which, if left untreated, can go on to develop into bowel cancer over time.
The pair, who will work alongside Dr Sunil Dolwani at Bowel Screening Wales, have received £514,000 from Cancer Research UK to develop the test.
Prof Dyson, who specialises in molecular microbiology, said: “This type of bacteria can be detected if bowel polyps are present, which may be because polyps provide the right environment for the bacteria to thrive,
including nutrients and the ability to hide from the immune system.
“We plan to use this safe strain of bacteria for people who don’t have symptoms, and if it stays in their system we hope it could be a way to help diagnose people with bowel cancer in the future.”
Currently, people can be screened for bowel cancer with a test at home, sent to everyone aged between 60 and 74 who is registered with a GP. The test detects tiny amounts of blood in poo which can be a sign of bowel cancer.
While the current test helps save lives from bowel cancer, like all screening tests it’s not perfect.
This new research will explore whether the new test could help to save even more lives.
Dr Parry, from Ferndale, Rhondda, said: “It’s fantastic to have an investment like this which could one day lead to a rapid test to diagnose bowel cancer at an earlier stage when treatment is more likely to be successful.”
The researchers are also looking at how the salmonella could be used to detect the exact location of polyps.
“It can be difficult to find some polyps during an endoscopy, but we have found that we can use the bacteria to help locate polyps which can’t always be seen on camera,” said Dr Parry.
If the research shows this test produces reliable results, there is also the potential to use the test to help diagnose other cancer types including breast and pancreatic cancer.
Dad-of-one Richard, who says he has been lucky to see his son Sam grow up, is backing Cancer Research UK’s Right Now campaign in Wales which highlights the day-to-day reality of life for those affected by cancer.
“Research is what gives me, my family and my friends the hope we need,” said Richard. “And I’m proud to be a part of this vitally important campaign and I hope people in Wales will donate or support in any way they can. Progress in the fight against this devastating disease relies on everyone who raises vital funds.”
Each year about 2,400 people are diagnosed with bowel cancer in Wales. When diagnosed at its earliest stage, more than nine in 10 people with bowel cancer will survive for five years or more.