Bowel cancer checks are continuing despite pandemic

CANCER experts in Derbyshire have urged patients to take part in bowel screening despite the NHS’s current focus on the Covid crisis.

It is aimed at those aged between 60 and 74 and, despite the pandemic, they say it is fully functioning from its base at Royal Derby Hospital.

Bowel cancer is the fourth most common cancer in the UK and the second biggest cancer killer.

Over 42,000 people are diagnosed with it every year in the UK. More than nine out of ten new cases (94%) are diagnosed in people over the age of 50, and nearly six out of ten cases (59%) are diagnosed in people aged 70 or over. But bowel cancer can affect anyone of any age.

More than 2,500 new cases are diagnosed each year in people under the age of 50.

Dr Stephen Hearing, clinical director of South Derbyshire Bowel Screening

Programme at the Derby and Burton health trust, said: “Bowel cancer is one of the most curable forms of cancer if it is treated early. Bowel screening is an important diagnostic tool in helping us to find cancers early and so it is extremely important that people participate in the programme.

“Screening kits are now offered to people between the ages of 60 to 74 and can be used by patients in their own homes to help detect the possibility of cancer at an early stage, when it’s much easier to treat. If the screening kit is positive, people will then be invited to a discussion with a view to having further investigations.

“Although the Bowel Screening Programme was paused during the Covid-19 pandemic, it is now fully functioning and initial test kits are being sent out and people will then be invited for further investigations, where required.”