ORLANDO, Fla. – A newly released study by the American Cancer Society found that more Americans are getting colon cancer at a younger age, though doctors don’t necessarily know why.
The study projects there will be more than 2.1 million new cancer cases and more than 611,00 cancer deaths this year alone.
Mary Bradham said she’s so blessed – she’s now cancer-free after being diagnosed with stage-2 colon cancer in 2018.
“I was very sick and had to keep going back and forth to different hospitals,” Bradham said.
“I was only 37 years old. I had four daughters, so that was very terrifying for me.”
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Bradham is now 42 years old and she wants to tell her story In hopes that younger people will get checked sooner. The new study by the American cancer society found that more younger Americans are getting colon, breast and cervical cancer. It said colorectal cancer was once the fourth-leading cause of cancer deaths for people under 50, but it’s now the leading cause for men and ranks second for women.
“It can be anybody. It can be any age. It doesn’t matter. You need to know the symptoms, you need to listen to your body,” Bradham said.
She said she went to get checked after she was volunteering with the Center For Change in Pine Hills and educating people about cancer.
Dr. Margarita Murphy is a colorectal surgeon at Orlando Health Cancer Institute.
“It used to be only 10% of the cancers that we saw for colorectal cancer happening to people younger than 55, now it’s one in every 5 tumors that are cancerous with patients 55 or younger,” said Dr. Murphy.
Dr. Murphy said it’s important in general for people to look out for things like excessive fatigue, irregular bowel movements, and significant weight loss, to name just a few.
She said they’ve lowered the age for colonoscopy screenings and said people with a family history should go sooner.
“Anybody who is 45 should have a colonoscopy immediately because we are seeing many in that age group with very advanced cancers,” Murphy said.
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