Your toilet habits could provide vital clues to your health – in some cases they could even signal a deadly cancer
Your bathroom habits could offer crucial health insights – and might even offer a warning sign of a lethal cancer. While changes in the colour and texture of your stool can often be harmless, typically due to alterations in diet, they could also signify something more serious.
Therefore, experts advise giving your stool a once-over before flushing it away. However, it’s not just the colour and texture that could indicate a problem – the shape of your poo might also suggest a health concern.
Specifically, healthcare professionals have warned that thin, narrow stools could be a sign of several issues, including bowel cancer, which is also known as colorectal cancer. According to something known as the Bristol Stool Chart, healthy faeces should be sausage-like in shape, either slender or with cracks on its surface.
As reported by the Daily Record, while an occasional narrow stool could simply point to constipation, it could also hint at chronic digestive problems such as irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), diverticulitis, and even cancer. Narrow stools can resemble a ribbon or a pencil.
In most cases, these can be a symptom of constipation, which means having fewer than three bowel movements a week or finding it difficult to pass stool. This could be due to lifestyle factors such as inadequate fibre consumption, insufficient hydration, and lack of physical activity.
However, Fight Colorectal Cancer suggests that thin stools can signal obstructions such as tumours, due to bowel cancer. The charity states: “For the most part, narrow stools that occur infrequently are not a cause for concern. But if you experience ribbon-like stools for more than a week, seek medical attention.”
This advice is echoed by health professionals at the Mayo Clinic in the US. They explain: “Narrow stools that happen now and then probably are harmless.
“But in some cases, narrow stools – especially if pencil thin – may be a sign that the colon is narrowing or has a blockage. And that could be due to colon cancer. Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) also may cause changes in the size of your stools.”
Additional bowel cancer warning signs
Bowel cancer is occasionally called a “silent killer” because it frequently doesn’t produce symptoms during its initial phases. Nevertheless, the condition can also prompt other changes in your bowel movements.
The NHS warns to look out for: “Changes in your poo, such as having softer poo, diarrhoea or constipation that is not usual for you.”
It may also modify how often you need to use the toilet. One concerning indicator of bowel cancer, which should trigger an immediate consultation with your GP, is blood in your stools, which might look red or black.
The NHS suggests ringing 111 or booking an urgent doctor’s appointment if your stools are black or dark red or you experience bloody diarrhoea. And if you have persistent bleeding from your bottom, you should call 999.
Other symptoms of bowel cancer include:
- Frequently feeling like you need to poo, even if you’ve just been to the toilet
- Abdominal pain
- A lump in your abdomen
- Bloating
- Unintentional weight loss
- Feeling extremely tired for no apparent reason
If you experience any of these symptoms, you should speak to a GP.