Jeremy Clarkson, 59, who’s currently hosting revived ITV gameshow Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? opened up about the moment he thought he had cancer after a trip to the bathroom. Looking down at the toilet bowel after he’d finished, he admitted he almost “had a heart attack”. He spotted blood red stains a symptom of bowel cancer. He explained: “I looked back to see what I’d produced and damn near had a heart attack.
“The whole bowl was stained blood red.”
Revealing his initial thought process at the time, he wrote in his August column for The Sun: “Well that’s it, I’ve got bottom cancer.”
But to the star’s relief, he later remembered he’d eaten some beetroot the night before – a vegetables which has been known to change the colour of urine and people’s bowel movements.
He joked: “Swear to God that study should come with a health warning, advising people that it will make your number twos the colour of Marilyn Monroe’s lips.”
The technical term for the presence of red beetroot pigments in urine and stools is beeturia.
But if you see persistent blood in your stools, you should see your GP.
This is one of three main symptoms of bowel cancer, advises the NHS, alongside:
- A persistent change in bowel habit – going more often, with looser stools
- Persistent lower abdominal (tummy) pain, bloating or discomfort – caused by eating and may be associated with loss of appetite or significant unintentional weight loss
Blood in stools can sometimes be caused by other health problems, such as piles.
Piles, also known as haemorrhoids, are lumps inside and around the bottom.
