BBC's George Alagiah shared cancer symptoms he wished he'd noticed month earlier
George Alagiah shared the bowel cancer symptoms he wished he'd caught earlier just a month before his death. The BBC journalist has sadly lost his battle with the disease today at age 67 after his agent confirmed he had died.
George was diagnosed with cancer nine years ago, but continued to work for the broadcaster, making him one of the channel's longest-serving newsreaders.
Speaking in June about an NHS campaign he was backing encouraging people to use a test kit to check for symptoms of bowel cancer, he said: “Had I been screened, I could have been picked up. I would have been screened at least three times and possibly four by the time I was 58 and this would have been caught at the stage of a little polyp: snip, snip.”
George Alagiah shared bowel cancer symptoms he wished he'd caught earlier just a month before his death (PA)Bowel polyps are growths in the large intestine or rectum and can be flat, raised or on a stalk.
Urging people to get themselves screened, George said: “As a bowel cancer survivor, I urge everyone who has received their kit not to ignore it. You don’t need to visit a doctor, you can do it at home, it could save your life.”
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The NHS asks anyone who receives a free test kit to “put it by the loo, don’t put it off” as recent data showed that almost 30% of people do not return the potentially lifesaving tests.
Dr Ajay Verma, a leading consultant gastroenterologist at Woodland Hospital of Kettering, explained: “The test is really effective and you can do it in the privacy of your own home. I realise that my patients may feel embarrassed about doing the test, but there’s no need. It’s hygienic and if you complete it when you receive it, it could help save your life.”
Screening is automatically offered from the age of 50 in Scotland, but only from 60, every two years, in England. Chances of survival for at least five years with stage four bowel cancer are less than 10%, while for stage one it is nearly 100%.
George supported the campaign by Bowel Cancer UK and Beating Bowel Cancer to make cancer screening available to everyone in England from the age of 50.
“We know that if you catch bowel cancer early, survival rates are tremendous,” he said. “I have thought, why have the Scots got it and we don’t?”
Symptoms of bowel cancer can include bleeding from the bottom, a change in bowel habits lasting more than three weeks, abdominal pain (especially if severe), a lump in the tummy and weight loss.
Father-of-two George found out he had bowel cancer in 2014 after complaining of blood in his stools. He then underwent 17 rounds of chemotherapy and five operations to treat the disease in 2014, which had spread to his liver and lymph nodes.
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