Bowel cancer symptoms

Some people have no symptoms and the bowel cancer is found through screening. However, many people with bowel cancer experience some of the following symptoms:

• blood in or on faeces (poo) or on the toilet paper; this might be bright red or make the poo look dark brown or black
• a persistent or unexplained change in bowel habits, such as diarrhoea or loose stools, constipation or smaller, more frequent bowel movements
• a change in the look of faeces (e.g. narrower or with mucus)
• a feeling of fullness or bloating in the abdomen (belly) or a strange sensation in the rectum, often during a bowel movement
• a feeling that the bowel hasn’t emptied completely after you have done a poo
• losing weight without trying to
• rectal or anal pain
• a lump in the rectum or anus
• abdominal pain or swelling
• weakness or fatigue, dizziness or breathlessness
• a low red blood cell count (anaemia or iron deficiency)
• a blockage in the bowel.

Other conditions can also cause the same symptoms, including:

• irritable bowel syndrome (IBS)
• diverticulitis (inflammation of pouches in the bowel)
• inflammatory bowel disease
• haemorrhoids, or an anal fissure (cracks in the skin lining the anus).

Having some of the symptoms on this list does not mean that you definitely have bowel cancer.

→ READ MORE: Bowel cancer diagnosis