• Talk to your doctor about the frequency and nature of your bowel movements. Going too often or not often enough can lead to additional GI symptoms that affect quality of life.
• Keep an eye on additional symptoms like bloating and variation in bowel movements as this may be a sign of bacterial overgrowth or digestive enzyme deficiency.
• Tell your doctor if you experience frequent heartburn, gas/bloating, or abdominal discomfort during routine visits.
• Be honest with your doctor when discussing if you smoke, how often you exercise, what you typically eat, and how much alcohol you drink in a given week.
• If you have a premature family history of colon cancer or colon polyps, speak to your provider about when it would be right for you to get screened for colon cancer.

Colon cancer screening: If you are under age 40 to 45 and have a family history of colon cancer or polyps, or if you have inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) or colon polyps, speak to your provider about getting screened for colon cancer. If you are aged 45 to 50, you should be screened according to the following recommendations.

• Yearly — stool-based fecal occult blood or fecal immunochemical test (FIT)
• Yearly or every two to three years — stool sDNA-FIT test
• Every ten years (more often if you have risk factors or polyps on prior colonoscopy) — colonoscopy
• Talk to your doctor about the frequency and nature of your bowel movements. Going too often or not often enough can lead to additional GI symptoms that affect the quality of life.
• Keep an eye on additional symptoms like bloating and variation in bowel movements, as this may be a sign of bacterial overgrowth or digestive enzyme deficiency.
• Tell your doctor if you experience frequent heartburn, gas/bloating, or abdominal discomfort during routine visits.
• Talk to your doctor about any fecal urgency or fecal incontinence. This can be a sign of other issues and, thankfully, has real proven interventions to help.
• Be honest with your doctor when discussing if you smoke, how often you exercise, what you typically eat, and how much alcohol you drink in a given week.
• If you have a premature family history of colon cancer or colon polyps, speak to your provider about when it would be right for you to get screened for colon cancer.

Colon cancer screening: From age 50 to 75, you should be screened according to the following recommendations. Once you reach age 76, you can talk to your doctor about whether continued colon cancer screening is needed based on your specific risk factors.

• Yearly — stool-based fecal occult blood or fecal immunochemical test (FIT)
• Yearly or every two to three years — stool sDNA-FIT test
• Every ten years (more often if you have risk factors or polyps on prior colonoscopy) — colonoscopy
• Talk to your doctor about the frequency and nature of your bowel movements. Going too often or not often enough can lead to additional GI symptoms that affect the quality of life.
• Keep an eye on additional symptoms like bloating and variation in bowel movements, as this may be a sign of bacterial overgrowth or digestive enzyme deficiency.
• Tell your doctor if you experience frequent heartburn, gas/bloating, or abdominal discomfort during routine visits.
• Talk to your doctor about any fecal urgency or fecal incontinence. This can be a sign of other issues and, thankfully, has real proven interventions to help.
• Be honest with your doctor when discussing if you smoke, how often you exercise, what you typically eat, and how much alcohol you drink in a given week.
• If you have a premature family history of colon cancer or colon polyps, speak to your provider about when it would be right for you to get screened for colon cancer.