The ‘C’ word? Oh, you mean Cancer – Let’s talk about it!

Lena Khagram-Dhar

Discussions around cancer awareness and prevention can sometimes generate much fear and prevent individuals from arming themselves with the necessary tools and wisdom to not only detect cancer early but also prevent it.  

Not many people are aware but bowel cancer is the third most common cancer in both men and women and the second leading cause of cancer deaths in the UK. This frightening statistic starkly justifies the importance of opening ourselves up to learning more and empowering ourselves to take practical steps, such as participating in screening to reduce our risk of getting bowel cancer which in many cases presents itself without any visible signs or symptoms. 

As a health improvement specialist working with diverse communities across north-east London, I have the important responsibility to make conversations around bowel cancer screening more “easily digestible”. However, some individuals find conversations about the ‘bowel’ and ‘cancer’ highly ‘un-palatable’ and embarrassing – it’s a double whammy for most as talking about these topics tends to require a certain degree of comfort, openness, transparency and more importantly fearlessness. 

My projects in community settings involve working with those aged 50 and over. Engaging with this age group is very insightful because it is an opportunity to learn about health beliefs and general attitudes to health which have become quite stable and ingrained over a long period of time. One particular belief which appears time and time again is that ‘a cancer diagnosis always means imminent death’. I have witnessed the power of this fear-provoking belief (or shall I say myth!) in preventing people from having open discussions about cancer – it’s still a taboo topic despite significant advances in technology for cancer prevention and treatment.

The fear associated with cancer is understandable and sadly it can’t always be detected early or prevented and may lead to death but I always ask individuals, ‘is it better to openly talk about common cancers like bowel cancer and participate in life-saving initiatives like the NHS Bowel Cancer Screening Programme and possibly find cancer early when it is more treatable than to avoid the conversation just because it’s too uncomfortable or too frightening?’

Following a workshop I facilitated on bowel cancer and screening, I asked a gentleman, ‘what would motivate you to participate in bowel screening now?’ He said, ‘Now that I know more about bowel cancer and screening, I owe it to myself to do something about it sooner rather than later. I would rather know if my health is fine now, than to wait for something to go wrong and by then it may be too late’. 

When individuals are encouraged to see another perspective and supported to overcome any deeply held fears about cancer, they feel a little more open and comfortable talking about this difficult topic. Subsequently, the old debilitating perceptions around health and disease have a chance to fall away and potentially make way for new empowering beliefs – this is where knowledge becomes power and a call to action. We’ve all heard ‘prevention is better than cure’ and this is precisely the purpose of the NHS Bowel Cancer Screening programme which is saving hundreds of lives every year through early detection and prevention. The bowel screening programme involves completing a simple test kit at home which is automatically posted to those registered with a GP. 

For more information about the bowel screening programme and eligibility criteria, you can visit the NHS Bowel Screening website: https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/bowel-cancer/ 

If you have received the NHS bowel screening test kit, take action now – it could save your life.