Monday, 1 September 2025, 11:31
Colorectal cancer is the most commonly diagnosed cancer in the province of Malaga, with a total of 1,400 new cases in 2024, followed by breast (1,283), prostate (1,222) and lung (1,088) cancer, according to the observatory of the Spanish association against cancer (AECC). Moreover, this figure has grown by almost 25% in just a decade. At the same time, survival, both in patients in whom this disease is located early and in those who already have metastases, is also on the rise. More than 60% of those diagnosed will manage to overcome it.
HM Hospitales oncologist Dr Laura Medina has highlighted the “remarkable” increase year after year, usually linked to changes in lifestyle habits. “Every day we are more sedentary. We have less and less healthy lifestyle habits, there is an increasing consumption of refined flour, we eat less vegetables, we move less and that is added to the pace of life we have, with a lot of stress and poor quality rest: there are more and more diagnoses of digestive tumours in general and of colon cancer in particular, including in younger patients,” she warned.
Dr Medina explained to SUR that the incidence of this cancer is increasing in people under the age of 50, although it is usually associated with older people. According to her, there is “no gene or other alteration” that could explain this, which implies that people’s lifestyles are the culprit.
The colon is a very long organ, with a right side, a left side and a third transversal side. “Depending on where the tumour is located, we will have certain symptoms or others: we should be alert when we have unjustified abdominal pain, heavy digestion that we did not have before, changes in bowel habits, i.e. constipation or a tendency to diarrhoea or bleeding when we have a bowel movement,” said Dr Laura Medina, adding that these symptoms can be confused with others that are consistent with various diseases such as “irritable bowel syndrome or haemorrhoids – banal symptoms that are also very common; or simply the typical gas that is produced because we eat quickly, because we have bad digestion”. “You have to be alert and, if the symptoms persist, consult a doctor.”
Prevention
The best prevention is “to try to eat as varied a diet as possible, with foods rich in fibre, fruit, vegetables and whole grains; to move and exercise; and to reduce stress levels”. When we also avoid tobacco and reduce alcohol consumption, “we could prevent practically 30% of all tumours, including digestive tumours”.
Dr Medina also remindedd both men and women in Spain that they can be screened for colon cancer. “From the age of 50, everyone should have a faecal occult blood test, which is a very simple test that is done through the GP. If it is positive, a colonoscopy from the age of 50 onwards is recommended,” the oncologist said.
Mortality rates associated with this common type of tumour are falling, above all thanks to screening and prevention campaigns. “With these early detection techniques, we can detect colon cancer in its early stages and be able to operate on patients. The only proper treatment today is surgery. This means that our patients are living longer and mortality is decreasing,” Dr Medina said.
Of the patients who undergo a surgery, “practically after five years, 90% are alive and will continue to live; for a patient who is diagnosed with metastasis, the average survival time has gone from 24 to 36 months. We can say that the average is 30 months”. Early detection campaigns, therefore, have ensured that, if the tumour is detected in the early stages, survival is 88%. More than 60% (64% in women and 63% in women) of colorectal cancer patients will survive, according to estimates by the Andalusian society of medical oncology (SAOM).
Early detection
As Dr Laura Medina highlighted, this cancer also affects women (535 cases in 2024), although it is somewhat more common in men (865). The major advances involve continuing the work on early detection, which is key to prolonging life and operating early.
“As for the patients we diagnose with an inoperable disease, nowadays the advances are mainly focused on finding molecules that can serve as specific targets: that is, we try to find mutations in genes that serve as a target, the core of which we attack with drugs.” In addition, there are other types of tumours that have special characteristics that “make them sensitive to immunotherapy”. In any case, the main concern is the decreasing age of those diagnosed. “The average age of the people we treated 20 years ago was 55 years and now, unfortunately, we are treating patients under the age of 40.”