Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards | Symptoms similar to colon cancer?!

I'm freaking out a bit because my stools have become more ribbonlike of late and I seem to be having more difficulty with constipation. I'm scared I might have colon cancer because I never had a colonscopy in my diagnosis of IBS!

I have had symptoms now for almost two years. Last year a G/I doctor did the following on me: barium Xrays, sitz markers transit study, pelvic ultrasound, and a sigmoidoscopy, besides bloodwork. He told me to choose the sigmoidoscopy over colonscopy because the colonscopy might cause perforation. (It's now dawning on me that my right colon may not have been adequately examined.) With these tests he declared me IBS-C. He also said that the sitz marker study showed slow colon motility. He tried me on Miralax, and Zelnorm without good effect.

I have been following an IBS diet without wheat and dairy for awhile and it has somewhat helped. But my main symptom is that I bloat out as soon as I eat, no matter what. That and pesky constipation. But the ribbon stools which I'm having sometimes just presented over the last several months.

I was just reading up on the symptoms associated with colon cancer and I am panicked, thinking that my testing was not complete - I didn't get my stool sampled for blood nor parasites neither.

Since I am in my 30s I think the doctor may have assumed the sigmoidoscopy was sufficient, that and it was an HMO so I just bet that procedure is far more cost-effective.

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