Britta Conrad urges fellow Northlanders to do life-saving bowel screening test

Mangawhai resident Britta Conrad tested positive for bowel cancer despite not having any symptoms and encourages others to do the bowel screening test.

Northlander Britta Conrad is counting her lucky stars she took a simple bowel screening test that probably saved her life.

Now the 64-year-old Mangawhai resident wants to spread the word about testing for the deadly disease during Bowel Cancer Awareness Month this June.

Her message to fellow Northlanders is: “Don’t hesitate or procrastinate, just do it and be well”.

“I didn’t have any symptoms, but I did it anyway,” she said.

“This is what I recommend to everybody; do the self-screening test.

“I did it because it was offered to me although I didn’t have any issues ... turned out I had bowel cancer.”

Conrad, a flax weaving artist, said she has a healthy diet, grows her vegetables and buys organic when she can, and does regular exercise.

The bowel screening test, which is free to New Zealanders aged 60 to 74 years, was sitting around for several weeks before she got around to doing it in February.

When the test came back positive, she had to undergo a colonoscopy, which found a small tumour.

Then she had a CT scan to see if the tumour had spread, followed by a meeting with the specialist who would do her surgery.

She had her operation on April 15.

“I didn’t expect that at all,” she said.

“Everything went really quickly.

“They found it was really small, we caught it at an early stage.”

New Zealand has one of the highest rates of bowel cancer in the world.

More than 3000 people are diagnosed with bowel cancer each year and more than 1200 will die from the disease.

Bowel Cancer New Zealand general manager Rebekah Heal urged New Zealanders to learn the symptoms and take action this winter.

Symptoms include seeing blood in the toilet after a bowel motion, change of bowel motions over several weeks, anaemia, abdominal pain or a lump in the abdomen, and tiredness and weight loss for no obvious reason.

“We are losing far too many loved ones to this disease every year, and we shouldn’t be,” Heal said.

“Bowel cancer is curable in 90 per cent of cases if caught early enough.

“Early detection and prevention are key, and that’s why our focus this June is symptom awareness.”

A dramatic rise in colorectal or bowel cancer in people under 50 is prompting calls for earlier screening for the disease.

The National-led Government has committed to lowering the screening age to 55 years old, but some, including Conrad, say it should start even earlier.

She said all ages should have access to free bowel screening tests.

As her experience was “really positive”, she posted it on social media to encourage others to take action.

“One reply was from a lady whose son-in-law died of bowel cancer aged 33. He was a tradie and the only symptom he had was a bad back.

“That’s one of the problems, it’s not a skin cancer that you can see, it’s hidden and it takes a while to get symptoms to make you aware of the issue.

“Once you have problems it’s probably already quite advanced.”

Visit bowelcancernz.org.nz/awareness-month to do the online symptom checker, host an awareness event, advocate for lowering the screening age, and set up a fundraiser to help beat bowel cancer.

Jenny Ling is a news reporter and features writer for the Northern Advocate. She has a special interest in covering roading, lifestyle, business, and animal welfare issues.