I pooped and then poked it with a stick - and you should too!

If you are Australian and over 50, the Government sends you a Bowel Cancer Test Screening Kit every two years.

And the bloody criminal part is that 40% of people who get these kits don’t use them. That’s a lost opportunity to potentially save your life.

Look, I get it - taking a stool sample doesn’t even make my top 1000 list of favourite things to do.

But then I remind myself that:

1. I’d rather do the poop-stick rigmarole than get cancer in my poop shoot.

2. There is a 90% (90%!!!) bowel cancer survival rate - if it is detected early.

And the odds of getting bowel cancer are too high for my liking. Australia has one of the highest rates of bowel cancer in the world.

Almost 5% of Australians will develop bowel cancer during their lifetime.

But early detection saves lives.

So this is a dose of Steve’s Tough Love:

• If you have one of those kits floating around, USE IT!!!

• If you were sent one and then misplaced it, no worries! Call the Program Information Line on 1800 118 868. Tell them you’ve been a bit of a nob about the whole thing but you’re now ready to man up, and ask them nicely to send you another one.

The screening kit tests for tiny amounts of blood, amounts that are too small to see with the naked eye, and which could come from polyps or pre-cancerous growths in the bowel. The technical name for it is the immunochemical Faecal Occult Blood Test (iFOBT).

And when you get your kit, take a few minutes to read the booklet that comes with it like I did.

Now off you go! Get that test!

Need more info? No worries! Here’s the official government website: http://www.cancerscreening.gov.au/bowel

PS: The title of this blog post was inspired by this ad by Cancer NSW: