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IBS-D Diarrhea Treatment About Diarrhea Predominant IBS
IBS-D advice. Best advice about your diarrhea predominant IBS is here for you.
If you suffer from Diarrhea predominant Irritable bowel syndrome, you will know the symptoms already -
persistent diarrhea
, urgency, abdominal pain, wind and bloating to name but a few, sound familiar?
The worst thing about all this is that symptoms can occur at any time, but sudden diarrhea after eating or diarrhea in the mornings are the most common. If you find your symptoms are occurring at night, the diagnosis should be reconsidered as this is really very unusual. In this section, I will discuss IBS diarrhea, the diet that may help your symptoms and other IBS-D treatment that may help your symptoms.
So What Causes Diarrhea Predominant IBS?
When you look at various
chronic diarrhea causes
, you have to consider whether this is true diarrhea or not. A lot of people describe diarrhea which would seem pretty obvious to most, but if you only open your bowels 1-2 times a day, it is very unlikely that you have real diarrhea.
Diarrhea is defined in various ways, but most of my patients define their diarrhea as going to the toilet to open their bowels too frequently and/or producing loose to watery stools. Now for the technical stuff! If you ask a doctor what diarrhea is they will define it by the stool weight of all things! The diagnosis of diarrhea is made if the stool weight is greater than 250g a day, although in practice this is rarely confirmed as most people really don’t want to go weighing stools.
IBS-D diarrhea is usually less than this as, whilst going to the toilet is frequent, the amount passed is often small in comparison to the urgency symptoms that most sufferers experience. I’m sure you recognise the need to get to the toilet urgently, but only to pass small amounts from the effort. That’s not to say that its all over very quickly, oh no It usually means sitting there sometimes for hours because the urge remains.
No one knows the cause of your symptoms, but it is likely to be multifactorial including influences such as foods, infections, environment, lifestyle and maybe genetics too as sometimes you do see an increase of IBS in some families.
What Investigations Are Required For IBS-D Symptoms?
Your IBS-D is diagnosed by the symptoms you experience and length of illness. To clarify this it is classified by the
IBS Rome Criteria
as abdominal pain with symptoms of diarrhea for 3 months or at least recurring diarrhea symptoms over this time. Sudden diarrhea after eating is common or in the mornings.
Investigations for your diarrhea are not always necessary, although the amount of investigation really depends on your age and history. If you are over 50 years of age with new onset of symptoms or have a young family history of bowel cancer, it would be wise to have further investigations. These may include blood tests, a stool sample and referral to a
gastroenterologist
for further investigations such as a
colonoscopy procedure
,
flexible Sigmoidoscopy
,
CT Colonography
or
barium enema
. You can gain more information on these investigations by looking at the links.
IBS-D Treatment
Your
treatment for IBS
diarrhea needs to be both effective and simple. Whilst drugs or “antidiarrheals” such as
loperamide (Imodium)
,
Codeine Phosphate
, Kaolin and Morphine, or more unusual treatments such as cholestyramine (Questran)can be effective, most sufferers understandably don’t want to be taking drugs in the long term.
So, what you need to be doing is determining strategies to reduce your diarrhea symptoms in the longer term. By far the best way of dealing with this is through special diets. The saying “you are what you eat” really does have some bearing in Irritable Bowel Syndrome. We all know that diet has an effect on Irritable Bowel Syndrome symptoms don’t we?
You probably know some foods that upset your diarrhea already. Sudden diarrhea after eating is well recognised by some sufferers. Taking a good fluid intake to maintain hydration, avoiding complex carbohydrates, fats and dairy products can all be helpful in reducing IBS symptoms. A nutritionist or dietician can be very helpful when reviewing this, but you can also learn more about the right diet for your IBS by going to the
going to the IBS diet page
.
Other Web Pages On This Site That May Interest You
Would you like to share your IBS-D with other sufferers? Below, you will find a submission form to do just that. This is totally anonymous (unless you wish to put your name to it and “come out”). It is a way of opening up on your symptoms and helping others too. If you are submitting details, you should try to make it at least 300 to 400 words long. Why? Because when you submit your discussion topic, you create a web page on the site. We know that search engines expect web pages to be at least 300 to 400 words long, otherwise they penalise the website so I can’t publish anything less (yes, don't blame me on this one, but Its always nice to read a story rather than a snippet!). It really is of benefit to you too as a long submission is more likely to gain a response from fellow sufferers. If you really can’t manage that sort of length, I will try to incorporate what you have said in to the main web page, but only if I feel it adds content that others will find of benefit. These obviously can’t be replied to in the same way as a longer submission so I would encourage you to write as much as you can. So......
Share Your IBS Story With Other Sufferers
Share your IBS with other sufferers here as outlined.