About Us At Let's Beat Bowel Cancer, we’re on a mission to reduce the incidence of bowel cancer – a condition that kills almost 5,000 Australians every year.
An initiative of Cabrini Health, Let's Beat Bowel Cancer is a not-for-profit, community awareness program dedicated to saving lives through improved bowel cancer research, education and prevention.
We know it’s possible to save many lives, because even though bowel cancer is the second greatest cause of cancer-related death in Australia – and the country’s most prevalent internal cancer in men and women – it is also the most preventable.
In fact, if all people over 50 did an annual home FOBtest – a simple, non-invasive test that can detect the early signs of bowel cancer – we could virtually say goodbye to bowel cancer, forever!
If you have a family history of bowel cancer, blood in your stool or any other symptoms, please consult your doctor as soon as possible.
Please take some time out to look around this web site, which explains more about bowel cancer, screening and prevention… it could save your life.
Emeritus Professor Adrian Polglase
- Destigmatise, demystify and increase awareness of bowel cancer as a major public health issue.
- Encourage every Australian over 50 to complete a home FOBtest every year. This simple test can detect the early signs of bowel cancer in time to prevent it.
- Improve knowledge of the environmental and genetic factors that can influence the development of bowel cancer.
- Improve awareness and attitudes on detection, investigation and treatment of bowel cancer.
- Promote support for ongoing bowel cancer research and education.
- The development of a prospective colorectal database registry, which is unique in Australia. The database offers a far more concentrated examination of the affect on outcome of patient medical co-morbidities than any previous database.
- A pilot study to investigate the intention to screen for bowel cancer amongst hospital employees with a view to developing “Bowel Cancer Free Zones”.
- A revised prospective randomised double-blinded trial comparing continuous wound infusion of local anaesthetic compared with placebo for post-operative pain control following colorectal surgery.
- An evidence-based trial comparing outcome and safety with the use of different clinical techniques for reusable elements of sigmoidoscopy: disposable versus reusable air insufflators as well as the use of commercial air filters.
- The use of Extracorporeal Magnetic Innervation (ExMI) in the management of faecal incontinence.
- A study examining methods of providing information to colorectal cancer patients.
- An assessment of “component training” in colorectal surgery training.
- A study of rectal cancer APR rates.
- A prospective randomised trial comparing laparoscopic and conventional open surgical treatments of colorectal cancer in adults.
- A multicentre study to determine the effect of an anti-inflammatory medication in the recurrence of neoplastic polyps in the large bowel.
- A pilot study involving in vivo imaging of normal and abnormal human colonic mucosa using fluorescence confocal endoscopic imaging of the lower and upper GI tract.
Better Health Channel
Founder and Chair
Emeritus Professor Adrian Polglase
Committee
Libby Crosthwaite
Pamela Darragh
Andrew Facey
Bryan Gurry
Des Jackson
John McMurrick
Graeme Sanford
Geoff Stansen
Staff
Jane McCasker
Patron
Peter Thomson
Ambassadors
John Fitzgerald
Todd Woodbridge
Geoff "Coxy" Cox