GPs are in the vanguard with regards to deciding the therapy options for individuals with Irritable Bowel Syndrome and they usually have to create decisions after just a few minutes having a patient complaining of typical symptoms like pain, diarrhoea and bloating.

Unfortunately, too often, GPs refer patients right to secondary line specialists, who perform procedures including colonoscopy to rule out cancer and other serious issues. When nothing is found, (out of the box a fact of life with IBS), the individual is discharged and back where she or he started. The merry-go-round can waste years when effective treatment might have been started, as well as time and money.

The merry-go-round can waster years when effective treatment might have been started, not to mention money and time.

In some cases, people are put on inappropriate medications such as opioids for a long time to deal with severe pain that they might have avoided.

In my opinion, simple misunderstanding implies that patients undergo unnecessary and uncomfortable procedures. There's infact a protocol that exists for suspected IBS patients, but it is rarely followed.

Ideally, if patients may use self help techniques to control the signs and symptoms of IBS they must be known a dietitian (based on NICE guidelines) who can enable them to manage their symptoms with more directed dietary intervention.

IBS is really a complicated beast but there are a number of different areas of diet that can be were able to alleviate symptoms, for instance:

@ Trying a FODMAP diet

@ Going gluten-free

@ Eliminating dairy or swapping to milk containing just the A2 protein

@ Taking a look at fibre within the diet

These dietary changes will alleviate the signs and symptoms in 60-70 per cent of IBS patients.

However, there are a substantial group of IBS sufferers who'll not get relief from their symptoms by dietary means alone. This group, which might well are convinced that their symptoms began following a nasty bout of gastroenteritis, is usually ignored. Actually, the latest NICE guidelines for that treatment of IBS only mentions bacteria once and this is to say you don't need to test for this!.

It is now well-known that IBS symptoms can be caused by overgrowth from the gut bacteria in the small bowel.

It is now well known that IBS symptoms can be brought on by overgrowth of gut bacteria within the small bowel.

Persistent overgrowth within the small bowel causes nausea, pain and cramping and as a result can result in sugars arriving in the colon before they can be digested properly. These sugars are then fermented rapidly this first area of the colon, causing excessive painful gas and irritating the gut lining. This accelerates transit of the contents of the colon, causing loose bowel motions and inhibiting absorption of nutrients and water.