Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy is sharing his cancer prevention journey with the world.
Portnoy, 47, underwent a colonoscopy on July 31 and documented the experience for his fans on social media.
The CEO announced in a video on X (formerly Twitter) on July 29 that he was preparing for the surgery in Boston as part of what he jokingly called his “checklist for Dave getting older.”
Before he began his fast and preparations, Portnoy said he “ate seven Giacomo’s dinners.”
Although he said he was scared to get tested, he stressed the importance of men getting tested, saying, “You have to get tested.”
“Colon cancer is the second leading cause of death among men, and it is treatable if caught early,” Portnoy said in the video.
(According to the latest statistics from the American Cancer Society, colorectal cancer is the third deadliest cancer for men, after lung and prostate cancer.)
Portnoy said he is partnering with Lead From Behind, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit organization, to raise awareness of colon cancer.
“I’m the captain, that’s what a captain does, they guide the ship,” he said.
On July 30, Portnoy jokingly posted, “I’m hungry. I might not make it anymore.”
The next morning at 5:48am, he posted, “Wake up, it’s time for a colonoscopy!”
He later shared a video of himself arriving at the facility, joking that there was no one there to check him in, despite being instructed to arrive an hour early.
At 7:18 a.m., after checking in and changing into a gown, Portnoy shared a selfie with the caption, “Ready to go.”
The surgery appeared to go well, and his next post was a short video taken after the procedure, showing him looking a bit groggy from the anesthesia.
Later that day, he posted a photo of his “second meal” after his colonoscopy.
Fox News Digital has reached out to Portnoy and Lead from Behind for comment.
Portnoy has previously spoken publicly about his health struggles.
In June, the social media personality revealed on her podcast, “The BFFs Pod,” that she’d been diagnosed with skin cancer and had surgery to remove it from her neck.
The condition was caused by “laying in the sun all day without sunscreen,” Portnoy said.
“I went to the doctor and they did some skin surgery and scraped it off and found out one of the tumours was cancerous so they had to remove it,” he added.
“Thankfully, the cancer wasn’t anything serious,” Portnoy later said on The X Show.
Portnoy is not the first public figure to publicly disclose that he has had a colonoscopy.
In 1997, journalist Katie Couric (then host of the Today show) underwent the first colonoscopy on air to raise awareness and encourage others to get tested.
Shortly before she underwent surgery, Couric lost her first husband to the disease.
In 2021, the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force updated its guidelines to recommend that adults begin regular screening for colorectal cancer starting at age 45.
