Published on 12 January 2024
A Warrington dad is urging people to complete an NHS bowel screening test if they get one as younger people become eligible for a check.
More people in Cheshire and Merseyside will be sent a home-testing kit to help detect signs of bowel cancer, as the NHS expands the lifesaving NHS Bowel Screening Programme to people aged 54 in England.
Those aged 54 and over will now automatically receive a home-testing kit every two years by post when they become eligible. The kit, known as the Faecal Immunochemical Test (FIT), checks for blood in a small poo sample, which can be a sign of bowel cancer.
Warrington dad Steve Hollington credits the FIT test with saving his life. He said: “Taking the bowel screening kit has saved my life, and potentially given me 20 more years to live it.”
Steve, who was diagnosed with stage three bowel cancer in 2022 after completing his first bowel screening, says that it was a “winning lottery ticket” that the kit landed on his doormat.
Shortly after returning the completed kit, the NHS contacted Steve to say further investigation was required and, after a colonoscopy, two tumours were found in his bowel. He said: “I could see that whatever the doctor had come across didn’t look good. After an MRI and a CT scan, I received the news confirming that it was, indeed, bowel cancer, which completely took me by surprise as I didn’t have a single symptom.”
Within weeks of diagnosis, Steve underwent surgery on his bowel and was fitted with a stoma to allow his bowel to heal. Eighteen lymph nodes were also removed, and he went through a three-month course of chemotherapy.
Steve said he realises that the fear of knowing you have cancer can be scary and overwhelming but said: “It’s a no-brainer for me. I had no symptoms. I would have carried on not knowing had I have not taken the test. And leaving it so long would have almost certainly been too late to receive the treatment I had.”
The FIT kit is already made available through the NHS Bowel Cancer Screening Programme to everyone aged 56 to 74. The phased expansion to people aged 54 years means an additional 830,000 people in England will now be eligible for the screening test.
People can call the free bowel cancer screening helpline for advice on 0800 707 60 60. Information on bowel cancer and the screening programme can be found here: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/bowel-cancer/