Bowel cancer screening does the heavy lifting for Tony

For most people the weekends fly by too fast.

But for 60-year-old Currumbin former crane operator Tony McCormack and wife Tanya, one February weekend last year could not have dragged any slower.

Tony had just been diagnosed with bowel cancer, after completing a free bowel screening test that was sent to him in the mail.

“I had a gut feeling for a little while that something wasn’t right with Tony, but I couldn’t put my finger on it,” Tanya said.

“For years I tried to get him to do the bowel cancer screening test that gets mailed to everyone over 50, and he just wouldn’t.

“But when a kit arrived on his 58^th birthday I said ‘Right, Happy Birthday. You’re doing it’,” she said.

This not-so-subtle shove from his bride of 20 years could well have saved Tony’s life.

“After the test detected blood in my faeces, I went to my GP who referred me to a colorectal surgeon who performed a colonoscopy at Tugun’s John Flynn Hospital,” Tony said.

“It revealed bowel cancer at the base of the colon.

“And as it always seems to be with these things, the diagnosis was delivered on a Friday afternoon and we had to wait until Monday to learn what was next, so there wasn’t much small talk at home that weekend.

“We were numb and just trying to absorb it all,” he said.

Thankfully for the couple, things were about to start moving quicky in the right direction.

“Nine months of intensive chemotherapy and radiation started in March last year, pretty well straight after the colonoscopy,” Tony said.

“Every fortnight on a Monday the chemo went all day, which gave me plenty of time to think about what would have happened if I had skipped the bowel screening again.

“The early detection gave the doctors the chance to stop it in its tracks without surgery and today I’m clinically clear and improving all the time,” he said.

Tony has also discovered a few things about himself that seem at odds with his knockabout persona.

“I’ve discovered my own mortality and I have empathy these days, something I never really had before.

“I always thought if blokes said they were sick, they were bunging it on and I didn’t empathise at all with them; it’s just the way I was brought up.

“The whole experience has brought about a massive change of mindset and recognition of the importance of a support network around me.

“The chemotherapy and radiation did its job, but it has been the support of Tanya and my two teenage boys, my friends down at my old gym and my former workmates; that has really help me enormously,” he said.

Tony has a simple message for anyone who is sent a bowel test in the mail.

“My advice is do the test and if you don’t do it for yourself, do it for your family.

“It literally takes five minutes and it’s free, so why wouldn’t you?

“And if you get the same sort of letter back that I did, it doesn’t mean it’s the end of the world, because it wasn’t for me,” he said.

According to the Cancer Council, bowel cancer is one of the most common cancers in Australia and the second highest cause of cancer death.

Each year around 400 Gold Coast residents are diagnosed with the disease.

If found early, almost all bowel cancers can be successfully treated, yet current national screening participation rates are sitting at about 40 per cent.

People wanting further information on the Australian Government National Bowel Screening Program can visit www.health.gov.au/nbcsp