Mine was 34 biopsies, but concentrated mostly in the anterior, and some random ones elsewhere. One apparently contained no sample, so 33 usable samples.
At my age 55 bowel screening, I was pulled off into a trial to have it done as a colonoscopy rather than the usual lollipop stick affair. I got the all clear, and remember thinking, phew, no cancer. Oh how wrong - less than a year later, diagnosed with PCa.
I was told I'd have another routine bowel screening at age 60 - I'm not clear if still part of the trial, and if that was to be a colonoscopy or back to a lollipop stick, but in any case, the colonoscopy screening program was permanently closed in December 2020 because of COVID, switching over entirely to lollipop sticks. I can tell them there's blood without returning the stick, as a result of radiotherapy.
You're lucky to get even a lollipop stick just now - bowel screening in much of the UK was mostly suspended because there was a backlog of 6000 positive tests which hadn't been followed up due to COVID. These would normally yield 500-600 cases of bowel cancer after followup.
Edited by member 09 Jan 2021 at 07:48
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