COLO-LIFE: Supporting a healthy lifestyle in people undergoing endoscopy

Aim

One way of reducing the likelihood of people getting a chronic health condition is to support those most at risk to live healthier lives. This is called an ‘intervention’. An intervention involves identifying groups of people who currently smoke, are overweight, physically inactive, or have a poor diet (including consuming alcohol above recommended levels), and supporting them to make healthier lifestyle choices.

An endoscopy is a procedure where organs inside your body are looked at using a long, thin, tube with a camera on the end (called an endoscope). Endoscopes can be put into the body through the mouth and down the throat, or through the bottom. An endoscopy is usually performed to investigate a specific symptom, or as part of routine bowel cancer screening. Click here for more information on endoscopy. 

People who need to have endoscopies also tend to have an increased risk of developing long-term health conditions compared with the general population. For example, scientific research has shown that almost 3 in 4 endoscopy patients are overweight or obese, and over half of patients have a moderate to high risk of developing heart disease in the next 10 years.

Because people attending endoscopy clinics are doing so for a specific reason related to their health (such as for bowel cancer screening), they may also be more open to learning about how their lifestyle choices can influence their health. This is often referred to as a 'teachable moment'.

We are designing an intervention that will involve offering healthy lifestyle advice to adults attending endoscopy clinics. 

We would like as many people as possible to use the intervention to support them to make healthy lifestyle choices. For this to happen, we need to make sure that people attending endoscopy clinics would see the intervention as being acceptable and appropriate. Therefore, we would like you to let us know what you think of the intervention. 

Volunteer Criteria

To take part in the survey you must have experience of having an endoscopy in the last 2 years, regardless of the outcome or the type of endoscopy (e.g. colonoscopy, gastroscopy, sigmoidoscopy etc).

What will I be asked to do?

You will be asked a series of questions to share your views on the proposed intervention. The survey will take approximately 10-15 minutes to complete.

When and where?

The survey can be completed online anytime until 30th April 2021.