What a fantastic discussion

Andy, Yes, the Doc has done a wonderful job of providing much needed information on ibs and a review of that topic is well worth the time. I believe that like myself most people on this board have taken the position that they will not be a willing victim to ibs and just curse the day, but look for answers to an illness that has siginificant impact on their well being. That said, I fear that to often people are here looking for the magic bullet cure to ibs and in their quest for answers they may in fact end up hurting them self. My own belief is that the diagnosis of ibs that has been given to all of us is, in reality, not one, but multiple disorders. But because no gross organic pathology can be seen, we're labeled by our symptoms. I'm sure this is the reason we see a situation where what works for one person will not work for the next and why ibs is such a difficult problem to tackle. This is not to say there is probably some significant overlay between conditions i.e. a person might have a heavy allergic component, but might also have symptoms brought on by stress, which might point out some defect in the autonomic nervous system in the GI tract. I look forward to seeing the results of the clinical trials on the new drugs and hope the FDA doesn't beat around the bush and gets them released to the public ASAP.Regards,Tom