'I felt like an idiot': Dad who forgot test in a drawer massively regretted it two years later

A man who left a cancer test kit in his drawer for two years has urged people not to make the same mistake as him after receiving a devastating diagnosis.

Paul Kelly, 64, says he is ‘filled with regret’ after ignoring his first screening test for bowel cancer four years ago. At the time the kit arrived in the post, Paul said he was preoccupied with his 60th birthday celebrations.

Two years later, he received a second routine test and immediately carried it out and sent it off, having realised that he’d completely forgotten to complete his first test. The results showed he had stage three bowel cancer.

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"The test arrived on the day of my party and I just thought 'I'm gonna deal with that another time'," dad-of-two Paul, from Staffordshire, told The Mirror.

"I popped it in a drawer. I have a drawer for things like that. And of course, a week or two goes by and I forgot about it.

"If you don't act immediately, the temptation is to sort of put it away and the original test was three samples so it looked a bit complicated.

"I thought I'll get around to that when I get a minute but then you never really get a minute."

Paul underwent surgery to remove his cancer and has spoken out during Bowel Cancer Awareness Month in the hopes of encouraging others to never miss taking the potentially life-saving test, which is sent out by the NHS to people aged 60 and over every two years.

On receiving the second kit in the post two years ago, Paul said: "That was the moment when I thought, 'Heck, that's still in the drawer’.

"When I opened it up, I was really pleased to see how much simpler the new one was. A covid test is honestly more intrusive than that. But when I got