If you’re concerned about your colonoscopy being painful, you’re not alone. It’s a common concern among individuals coming in for their first exam. Allow me to put your fears to rest.
If your procedure is done using one of the newer anesthetics, you will experience no pain during your colonoscopy.
In fact, you will have no experience of your procedure whatsoever since you will be asleep before it begins and wake up shortly after it’s done. Typically, the actual colonoscopy only takes around 15 minutes.
The main advantage of doing a colonoscopy is because it finds polyps (small benign growths in the colon) before they can turn cancerous. The polyps can usually be easily removed during the exam, thus markedly reducing your chances of ever getting colon cancer.
This in fact, is the entire point of having a colonoscopy. The important thing to remember is that you should do your colonoscopy early on, generally 45 years of age, so your lifetime risk from colon cancer will be much lower.
Population health experts estimate that about 30% of the adult population of the US has still not gotten screening with colonoscopy putting them at far more risk than necessary. So, the most important intervention you can make is to get your colonoscopy early on.
If no polyps are found, and you have no family history or other risk factors, the next colonoscopy can usually wait ten years. That’s the best news we can give a patient after their exam.
When you’re ready, call our office to book an appointment or use our convenient online form here on our website.
