I have been going to my GP for over a year - actually closer to 18 months or more - with exhaustion, diarrhoea, blood in my stools, forgetfulness and inability to concentrate, breathlessness on exertion, abdominal pain.
He seemed unable to put the clues together.
The diarrhoea was due to my diabetes tablets, the bleeding was due to my IBS (although he did check for piles with a proctoscope), the exhaustion and breathlessness were because I needed to lose weight. The forgetfulness was just lack of concentration. The abdominal pain was liver (2 ultrasounds later he put it down to non-alcoholic fatty liver disease).
Eventually in January this year, while on holiday I had two massive bleeds - bathroom looked like a scene from CSI - and went back. My GP was on holiday - hallelujah - and I saw one of the other practice doctors who referred me immediately to get it looked at.
The registrar I saw immediately ordered a colonoscopy and put me on a 2 week referral. I had the colonoscopy where they took biopsies from a large area in my lower bowel, near the rectum. As the doctor doing the scope thought it was likely to be malignant, he sent me for a CT scan. When the results of that came through I was sent for an MRI scan and saw a surgeon 4 days later.
That was yesterday - I have an appointment on Monday to have my colon cancer removed. It looks to be stage one so hopefully surgery will do the trick, but I have to wait until they check the area and lymph nodes to see if I'll need anything else.
Looking back I wish I'd asked to see one of the other doctors in the practice a lot earlier - don't rely on your GP!
