March marks the start of Colorectal Cancer Awareness Month and health professionals at Lima Memorial broke out their blue to encourage folks to get their colons checked.
Lima Memorial's proctologist and her team put on their best blue and handed out information on colon screenings at an awareness celebration they held at the hospital. Colon cancer is the 3-rd leading cause of cancer-related deaths, and it's one that often gets overlooked because symptoms do not usually show up until later stages.
"I think unfortunately over the past several years we've been more inclined to breast cancer, lung cancers," said Wesley. "I wish and hope for the future that people will take colon cancer a little bit more seriously. I think colon cancer is only diagnosed in later stages. The earlier stages don't have as many symptoms."
The American Cancer Society recently lowered its recommendation to start screenings from 50 to 45 years old.
