[karlastitches]

I am new here, but feel that I have come to a good place to discuss an embarrassing problem. I was diagnosed with IBS in 1991, but the truth be known, I have had it much longer. I am 42, married, and have 3 children. A couple of weeks ago I had bronchitis and they put me on augmentin, which I took for 2 days, and had horrible diarrhea, so they switched me to zithromax which I tolerate better, so the diarrhea slowed but not completely. My stool returned to normal. I have been taking metimucil for a year and thankfully all the diarrhea I had before due to ibs slowed greatly. Anway after my stool was more normal, not hard, but soft. I noticed a red stripe of bright red blood on it. Only on one side and mostly now after 5 days, there is less and only at the end of the movement. A year and a half ago, I had an episode like this, went to the er, they did this little scope thing, and told me it was an internal hemmrhoid. My question is, should you check out bleeding everytime it happens, or assume it is from the hemmrhoid. I worry excessively about colon cancer and all other cancers. Thanks for listening

 

[Kathleen M.]

Bright blood on stool is almost always from a hemaroid or other anal problem (like a fissure) but that doesn't mean you should just ignore it either. It may be worth a call to the doctor to see if this is a bad enough episode for being seen and re-evaluated. Just because you have internal hemmies (and they don't go away ) doesn't mean that they can't have become flared up and needing treatment, or that you can't get a fissure or other problem at that end that needs treatment.If you get a call into the doctor, either the doc or one of the nurses should be able to help you figure out if this is a "need to be seen" thing or a "treat on your own" thing, or let you know at what point it becomes something you need to be seen about (like if the bleeding stops on it's own by X days...).Blood with colon cancer is usually not visible on the stools and is rarely bright because the blood has aged by the time it comes out.K.