Increased risk... I dunno of any stats, per se, but the obvious reasons are that a lot of the areas (assuming one of the cancers in question is colo-rectal) giving increased risk are enflamed... so finding something in a healthy colon would be easier than in a colon pockmarked from the disease. and a lot of the warning signs would be masked by the symptoms... I mean, I for one wouldn't hit the panic button at the sign of any blood in my stool... but a healthy person w/o IBD? All the alarms bells would be going off.. (or at least should).. And, if you have IBD, then a lot of the drugs you may be taking have an elevated risk factor by default. I just started imuran... and now have to wear an SPF sunscreen of at least #35 as a precaution... else my elevated chance of skin cancer places me in a 'high risk' category. So, all in all, with the masking of symptoms, and the fact that we all tend to focus on just what's in front of us (like, I mean, IBD affects me daily, rarely do I stop to consider 'cancer'.. despite the fact that I've been told my risk is higher than it was pre-IBD.. do I really want to put that on my plate to digest daily also?)
and then factor in all of those nices meds that give increased risk YET AT THE SAME TIME lower our immuno responses... and then you start to get the 'big picture'..
As for how long it takes to develop, spread... Well, again, in a 'healthy' system, it's a lenghty process. I can't recall how many cases Iv'e heard of where it was caught before it got thru the wall of the digestive system to where it could really take off. But, in a compromised intestinal system.. with deep scarring from ulcers, or a path cut by a fistula, or a fissure, or just from years of the disease eating away at the tissue, or the lack of the protective mucuous, then the timeline is probably far less.
I dunno. I'm not a doctor, much less an GI or oncologist. But it seems to be logical that any chronic, long term illness, esp one of the IBD's, and the risk of cancer, and espically colo-rectal, is going to be increased. That's just the hand we are dealt.
Is it all bad news? No, I don't think so. First off, we deal with doctors frequently, and they should be aware of all of the risks, and they should be watching for this.. We have to do our share.. watch for signs, note any changes, report them if we do
And, we have all of those lovely tests.. OK, so maybe it is easier to see a 'tumour' in a healthy colon via colonoscopy, but how many healthy people have them done?
and there is the bloodwork, the X-rays, the ultrasounds, the CT and MRI scans.. In the past 3 years, I have been examined, cut into, poked around in, up & sideways more times than I can count.. Surely, if anything else was going on, someone in the group grope would have seen something.. In any event, I don't recall being told that IBD is a 'killer', just the opposite, and altho overall my risk of cancer is a lot higher now, I don't get the impression from my doctors that if the IBD doesn't get me that cancer will. or that associated cancer is the kill factor for one with IBD
That's just my take on the subject... Think perhaps you were hoping (or clutching) for a more positive response.. Sorry if I dissappointed.. But I think that what will be, will be. Don't get me wrong.. I'm totally into the 'ounce of prevention' method, but I also think that waiting for the proverbial 'cancer' shoe to drop isn't the best way to pass ones time when you already have a disease that seems to thrive on stress. Like, don't go feeding the devil you know while waiting for another who may never show up. That's a common sense approach I learned from my mom, a cancer survivor who was supposed to die from it 45 years ago, but just wouldn't...
