I often joke that men only go to the GP if something stops working or falls off. It usually gets a laugh, because most men recognise themselves in it, and most women recognise the men in their lives too. The funny thing is that when you scratch beneath the joke, it isn’t really funny at all.
As Men’s Health Week 2026 gets underway, it’s worth asking why so many men still struggle to seek help when something doesn’t feel right. We live in a world where men track their steps, count their calories, monitor their sleep and spend hundreds of pounds on fitness watches capable of measuring everything except whether they’re making sensible decisions about their own health.
Yet many of us will happily ignore symptoms for months. Sometimes years. We’ll convince ourselves that whatever is happening will sort itself out. We’ll blame stress. Work. Age. Too much coffee. Too much beer. Too much food. Not enough exercise. We’ll come up with almost any explanation except the one that requires us to pick up the phone and make an appointment. I know because I’ve done it myself. Most men have. The problem is that not every symptom is harmless.
Take heartburn. If I asked you to list symptoms that might be associated with cancer, heartburn probably wouldn’t make the top ten. Most people think of it as one of life’s minor annoyances. Something that happens after a curry. Something that arrives after Christmas dinner. Something you deal with by chewing a couple of tablets and carrying on with your day. That’s exactly what makes it dangerous. Because when a symptom becomes normal, we stop paying attention to it. We stop asking questions. We stop wondering why it’s there. And eventually we stop seeing it as a symptom at all. It simply becomes part of life. The packet of antacids stays in the kitchen drawer. The medication becomes part of the weekly shop. The burning sensation after meals becomes something we work around rather than something we investigate.
Most people will have occasional heartburn, and it isn’t a sign of cancer. That’s important to say. But persistent heartburn is not something that should simply be accepted as normal. That’s because long-term acid reflux can damage the lining of the oesophagus, the tube that carries food from your mouth to your stomach. Over time, some people develop a condition called Barrett’s oesophagus, which increases the risk of developing oesophageal cancer. Again, most people with Barrett’s oesophagus will never develop cancer. Most people with reflux will never develop Barrett’s. But some will. And those people matter.
Every year around 9,300 people in the UK are diagnosed with oesophageal cancer. Around 8,000 people die from the disease. Those numbers make oesophageal cancer one of the UK’s deadliest cancers, yet it remains one of the least talked about.
Perhaps that’s because the symptoms don’t seem dramatic enough. There’s no obvious lump. No sudden collapse. No flashing warning light. Instead, there is often heartburn. Indigestion. A cough that won’t quite go away. A voice that’s a little hoarser than it used to be. A sensation that food occasionally sticks when swallowing. They’re the sort of symptoms many people can live with. And that is exactly the problem.
One of the cruellest things about oesophageal cancer is that it often hides inside symptoms people think they already understand. I’ve spoken to people affected by the disease over the years, and a common theme emerges again and again. Looking back, many remember the signs. They remember the heartburn. They remember buying remedies from the chemist. They remember assuming it was stress or diet or getting older. What they didn’t realise at the time was that the symptom they had normalised was trying to tell them something.
Of course, the story isn’t just about heartburn. It’s about behaviour. It’s about the way many men approach their health.
Research has consistently shown that men are less likely than women to seek medical help. A major UK study found men’s consultation rates in general practice were around a third lower than women’s. More recent GP Patient Survey data found that only 38% of men had seen a GP in the previous three months compared with 48% of women. (https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/3/8/e003320)
Those numbers matter because they tell us something important. Men aren’t necessarily healthier. We’re just less likely to ask for help. Sometimes that’s because we’re busy. Sometimes it’s because we don’t want to make a fuss. Sometimes it’s because we convince ourselves the symptom isn’t serious enough. And sometimes, if we’re honest, it’s because we’ve been conditioned to believe that carrying on regardless is somehow admirable. But there is nothing admirable about a delayed diagnosis. There is nothing brave about ignoring symptoms. And there is certainly nothing weak about seeking reassurance.
The irony is that many men will spend more time researching a strange noise from their car than they will investigating a symptom in their own body. We understand preventative maintenance when it comes to our homes, our finances and our vehicles. For some reason we struggle to apply the same logic to ourselves.
That’s why Men’s Health Week matters. It’s not simply about encouraging men to live longer. It’s about encouraging men to value themselves enough to act sooner.
To ask questions. To seek advice. To recognise that early action is often the difference between a problem that can be managed and a problem that becomes much harder to treat.
Talk to your pharmacist. Talk to your GP. Have the conversation. Because the reality is that the old joke about men only going to the doctor when something stops working or falls off isn’t really a joke at all.
It’s a warning. And it’s one we can no longer afford to ignore.
If you have found David’s blog post helpful you may like to find out more about his cancer journey and experiences.
