Colonoscopy is preventive, diagnostic, and therapeutic — and often, it is all of these to save your life from the dreaded cancer. Since anyone can have colorectal or colon cancer at any time without warning or symptoms, screening is the best way to stay ahead of it. While screening, your gastroenterologist may also remove suspicious tissues for testing and prevention.
According to experts, the procedure can be made helpful by taking some pain out of the process. A colonoscopy is done to examine the colon and rectum for abnormalities like polyps, colon cancer, or any kind of inflammation. For that, the colon has to be cleared out, and loads of laxatives are the only way to accomplish that.
However, according to Dr. Derek Ebner - a gastroenterology fellow at the Mayo Clinic, there are a few ways to make colonoscopy bowel prep easy and manageable. When should you start your preparation for colonoscopy? Dr.
Ebner says a week before your scheduled colonoscopy, there are a few small changes you must make in your diet. Often, the day before the colonoscopy when you begin to drink the bowel prep solution – many people struggle. However, you have to make it easy.
"There's a couple of tricks. Often, cooling the solution and drinking it through a straw can be helpful. Others like to have a small lime or lemon wedge that they just bite into after doing some of the solution," Ebner told The Health News website.
According to Dr. Ebner, chewing gum between sips of the solution helps red.