How can parents detect inflammatory bowel disease in their children early?

Author: Fan Xueshun, Chief Physician of China-Japan Friendship Hospital

Reviewer: Lin Guole, Chief Physician, Peking Union Medical College Hospital

Inflammatory bowel disease is more common in young people, but it is also uncommon in children aged 2-5 years old.

1. How can parents detect inflammatory bowel disease in their children early on?

It’s mainly about careful observation.

If the child often has unexplained abdominal pain, looks pale and thin, and may complain of stomach discomfort or stomach pain, parents should pay attention to their bowel movements. If the bowel movements are abnormal, especially after eating various foods, the stools become thinner, the frequency increases, and there is even blood in the stools, parents must pay attention to the possibility that the child has inflammatory bowel disease.

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For parents, it may not be easy to judge clearly, so they need to go to the hospital for examination, such as stool analysis (routine stool analysis + occult blood test), or even barium meal radiography to check the intestinal condition. If the hospital has the conditions, they can also do colonoscopy for the child to determine whether it is inflammatory bowel disease.

Of course, if the child is infected due to unclean food, it will form bacillary dysentery or enteritis, which is the so-called bacterial infection. It can be cured through antibiotic treatment, but inflammatory bowel disease may not be cured through anti-inflammatory treatment. So at this time, you must pay attention, this disease may be inflammatory bowel disease.

2. What are the dangers of having inflammatory bowel disease in children?

If a child suffers from inflammatory bowel disease, he or she will experience abdominal pain and diarrhea, including bloody stools, just like adults.

Because of frequent attacks, the child's intestinal absorption function will be relatively poor, a large amount of nutrition will be lost, and various trace elements and minerals required for the child's development will be lost in large quantities, thus affecting his development.

Therefore, once a child has inflammatory bowel disease, it will affect his development. He will be smaller than other children of the same age and appear pale and thin. Affected development is the greatest harm to the child.

3. How to treat children with inflammatory bowel disease?

First, general treatment is to maintain the balance of nutrition, water and electrolytes. In addition, pay attention to giving him a high-energy, high-protein, low-residue, low-fat diet. Some seriously ill children can also be given blood transfusions. In addition, adjust his acid-base balance. If he has diarrhea, vomiting, or fever, you can also give him corresponding symptomatic treatment.

Second, drug treatment. Children’s drug treatment mostly uses glucocorticoids. In addition to anti-inflammatory drugs, this type of drug can also act as an immunosuppressant.

Third, nutritional support therapy. Because children often lose energy and nutrition when they have a disease, they should be given more trace elements, including various vitamins, during the course of the disease. When necessary, we can give them elemental diets. Elemental diets contain various nutrients and amino acids. Its characteristic is that it can be directly absorbed in the intestines without being digested by the stomach, so it is good for the recovery and development of children. Children should pay more attention to nutritional support therapy.

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Finally, if the child has been treated with medication but there is no effect, and there is heavy bleeding, perforation, or even toxic megacolon, surgery should be considered; some children have no effect after repeated treatments, which has affected the child's development, and surgical treatment should also be considered; in addition, if the child has anal and perianal diseases, or pelvic and abdominal abscesses, surgical treatment should also be considered.

4. How should children with inflammatory bowel disease choose their diet?

Children are not like adults. They rarely eat spicy food. Their main nutrition comes from milk, eggs, various vegetables, fruits, and other foods. For children, sometimes, like adults, they need to eat easily digestible, high-calorie, high-protein foods, and a low-residue diet.

Also, if your child suffers from frequent diarrhea, you should reduce the intake of greasy and fried foods, because greasy food will affect the intestines. You can eat more egg custard, chopped beef or mutton, which are good for his nutrition.

Some children need to drink milk for a long time. Many people think that milk can cause diarrhea, so they don't let their children drink milk. This is unnecessary because milk is very helpful to the human body when children grow up. Of course, if the child's symptoms get worse after drinking milk, don't drink it. If the symptoms don't get worse, just drink it normally.