People living in towns with an income of over US$500, as well as those with diabetes, are more prone to developing colon cancer compared to those who eat traditional diets. This was revealed Dr. Katsidzira and his team discovered that individuals earning more than US$500 were consuming highly processed foods, which are linked to increased risk.
According to the study, published in the European Journal of Cancer Prevention (2019), people who had ever lived in town had an odds ratio of 3.6 (95% confidence interval: 1.1 to 12.2, p=0.036), while those with diabetes mellitus had an even higher risk, with an odds ratio of 5.3 (1.4 to 19.9, p=0.012). “That’s actually interesting, because below that we put income, divided it into US$200, then US$200, then US$500, US$501 up to more than US$1,000. And yes, the higher your income is, the more likely you are to develop colon cancer.
And when you broke it down, it ended up being anyone who had lived in town was actually more likely to get colon cancer,” Dr. Katsidzira said. “Unfortunately, the people with diabetes also came out as having a higher likelihood of developing colon cancer, as well as having cancer in a first-degree relative.
And this is data from Zimbabweans. And I will rush through this briefly, but what it really showed as well is that people who stuck to a traditional diet with lots of vegetables, fruits, and so forth were protected from colon cancer, unlike those who were on a diet that’s quite rich in processed food,” he added. He also noted that 5.5 percent of the colon cancer cases observed were hereditary, with the rest linked to diet and lifestyle.
“When we looked at 90 cases of people with colon cancer, what we actually picked is that three of them had what is called Lynch syndrome, which is a familial colon cancer syndrome. And probably in Zimbabwe, I would say, of the cases of colon cancer that we see, only about 5.5 percent are hereditary. The vast majority are sporadic diseases, meaning that they are coming from what we eat more than anything else,” he said.
Dr. Katsidzira also warned that they are seeing patients as young as 20 years old being diagnosed with colon cancer. “And this just looks at what we call age-specific incidence of colon cancer in Zimbabwe.
And I think what you must just take from there is that the incidence of cancer in our population actually starts fairly early. You have people with colon cancer in their 20s and 30s,” he said. Meanwhile, Zimbabwe’s public health system does not currently offer colonoscopy services, forcing people to rely on expensive private alternatives that cost between US$200 and US$300.
A colonoscopy is a medical procedure that allows doctors to visually examine the inside of the colon and rectum using a flexible tube equipped with a camera and light. It helps detect polyps or cancer and identify abnormal growths or cancerous cells. It is also used to investigate digestive symptoms like bleeding, diarrhea, or abdominal pain, and allows for the removal of potentially precancerous growths.
“There’s no functional colonoscopy at any of the public hospitals. That’s a big thing. So, you can’t talk about the cost of something that’s not there,” Dr.
Katsidzira said. Dr. Katsidzira says there is now one new clonoscope available at Pari.
At the time the article was written there were none.He noted, however, that a new colonoscope had recently been made available at Parirenyatwa Hospital, a development that came after the period covered in the study. He urged Zimbabweans to seek medical help when they notice symptoms. “Rectal bleeding.
People who have anemia. People who have a change in bowel habit. People who have loss of weight.
Abdominal pain and a family history of colon cancer. “And the things that I’m actually just rattling off now are the symptoms of colon cancer. Seeing blood is an alarm feature.
You probably should not ignore it. Even though a lot of it is from hemorrhoids, you must still get that checked. “Having a change in the way you go to the toilet.
You used to go clockwork every morning when you woke up. Then all of a sudden, you are going three or four times in a day. Or your stool form has changed.
You are sometimes getting diarrhea. Sometimes you are getting constipation. You are losing weight with no reasonable explanation.
“It’s not that you have tried to start exercising or watching your diet. Your weight is just going down. You must be checked,” he said.
Dr. Katsidzira also pointed out that many Zimbabweans urgently need colorectal cancer screening. “I don’t y think we are at the stage where we can afford to just pick healthy people and say, let’s check you for that, let’s check you for that, because the number of people with symptoms who also need the service is huge.
“Because you can’t, for example, say let me do screening colonoscopies at Pari. And when you do the screening colonoscopies, you then displace people who actually are sick, and in more urgent need,” he said. IMAZ Harare chair Dr.
Ismail Ticklay said the awareness event was aimed at helping men prevent common cancers such as prostate, colorectal, and lung cancer. “The Islamic Medical Association of Zimbabwe decided to hold this occasion to make people aware of the types of cancer especially in men . We decided to have an awareness of the three most common cancers in men, which are prostate, lung cancer, and colorectal cancer.
“That’s why we decided to have this, to make people aware of it so that they can prevent it rather than treat it, because it’s so much more expensive to treat it than prevent it. We invited speakers, specialists in that area, to come and talk about it, give their view about it, how they can prevent it and treat it and get the early signs so that they don’t have to eventually die from it,” he said. You must belogged into post a comment.
Source: HealthTimes
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