Bowel Cancer Symptoms are described below.  If you think you have bowel cancer, don't be afraid.  Alternative Medicine provides several herbal cures such as essiac, ellagic acid, and graviola, and several electromedicine therapies including devices from Rife, Beck, and Lakhovsky.  Learn how cancer is the result of symbiotic organisms turning parasitic due to a diet that is too acidic. Learn how to prevent cancer by consuming an alkaline diet; see the links to the left.

Bowel cancer, also known as colon cancer, is a type of cancer that grows in the colon, or large intestine.  This is the lower part of the intestines that is involved in absorbing nutrients and water from the digested food.  The bowel can be divided into three sections, the ascending, traverse, and descending colon.  The rectum at the end of the colon is where the feces collect before they are expelled through a bowel movement.

Bowel cancer is most common in people over the age of 50, and rare under 40.  Bowel cancer is the third most common cancer after lung and breast cancer in the US.  In most cases, bowel cancer begins as a polyp and if left untreated grows into a tumor. A polyp is a small ball of tissue that sticks out on a stalk from the lining of the bowel. Sometimes polyps contain an adenoma - an overgrowth of cells from the bowel lining. Most large bowel cancers develop from a pre-existing adenoma.

Bowel Cancer Symptoms
It is important to emphasize that most people with bowel cancer have no symptoms, especially when it is just developing.  Reported symptoms include:

• Pain, cramps, or tenderness in the lower abdomen

• Constipation

• Diarrhea that lasts for more than several days

• Weight loss

• A lump in the abdomen

• Different stools that may have different size or shape

• Change in bowel habits

• A feeling of fullness in the bowel that is not relieved by a bowel movement

• Pain in the appendix

• Jaundice (a yellowish coloration of the skin)

Bowel cancers have a tendency to bleed easily, so blood in the stool is cause for concern. But usually blood is the result of piles (hemorrhoids). Not all polyps bleed, and not all polyps bleed all the time. The blood might be invisible to the naked eye, but the loss can result in anemia (a shortage of iron) which can cause tiredness and breathlessness.

A physical examination will rarely show any abnormalities. A rectal examination will reveal rectal cancer but not colon cancer.  A colonoscope is able to view the entire colon for evidence of cancer.

You can see pictures of the colon here.
 

Modern science does not know what causes cancer, and the attempt at prevention is really just early detection.  You can avoid the fear of cancer if, rather than watch for symptoms, you learn the cause of cancer and how to prevent it. But should you get it, alternative medicine offers natural herbal and electromedicine cancer cures; see the links below.

Related links

Choose Your Cancer Cure.

Prevention and Cause of Cancer.