Diarrhea and vomiting : Acute intestinal infections : How to diagnose, treatment, and outcome.

Diarrhea and vomiting : Acute intestinal infections : How to diagnose, treatment, and outcome.

Posted by Unknown on Monday 11 August 2014 0

"With years of indigestion at least once faced each''

Photo from livingsu.syr.edu

In a little more perishable products and ready-made meals, active breed disease-causing microbes, more temptations - to eat a berry bush or pie pan questionable. Sometimes OCI (acute intestinal infection) is safe, sometimes facing severe complications. How to protect yourself?

Diarrhea and vomiting - what is the reason?

The main symptoms of intestinal diseases are known to everyone. Person feels nausea, pain and tension in the stomach, it begins to vomit, diarrhea appears. Why is this happening?

Before microbes seeking to penetrate the human body, it is worth a lot of barriers. The first - the mouth. Man feels the taste and smell of food, and instinct makes him an aversion to the stench of moldy stuff, sour and putrid bitterness. Saliva contains a bactericide lysozyme. But this is not always enough.

When spoiled or contaminated food or water microbes into the stomach, begins the process of digestion. Toxins enter the blood with nutrients, irritate the mucous membrane of the stomach and intestines. Disturbed acid composition (you know, that in the gastric juice contains sulfuric acid), producing gases, "rebels" intestinal flora, being displaced by opponents. The body get rid of the poison in a hurry, regurgitate it, but some part in any case time to "work" - hence the weakness, dizziness, temperature rise and other unpleasant symptoms even light OCI.

In mild poisoning from eating enough to get rid of that after 6-8 hours to recover. If unpleasant symptoms last longer, and vomiting and diarrhea do not bring relief, then microbes seriously attacked the body. Bacteria multiply in the intestine, damaging the mucous membrane (bloody diarrhea), depletion disrupts the functioning of the gall bladder, the kidneys are not overloaded do their job. In cases of severe diarrhea and vomiting occurs dehydration. In severe cases, the brain suffers - innocuous at first glance, E. coli causes including meningitis. Without treatment, the OCI can result in death, especially in children up to 3 years (the leading cause of child mortality in Africa), the elderly, pregnant women and people with poor health.

Put the diagnosis

In any medical directory, you can find a long list of dozens of food and intestinal infections. Here and typhoid fever, and cholera, and dysentery (amoebic and bacillary), and insidious rotavirus, salmonella and painful. Indigestion is caused and rickettsial, and Shigella, and klebsillami, and Yersinia, and other microorganisms. Can cause diarrhea immature fruit, excess herbs, vegetables, homemade milk, unusual composition of the water. Under an intestinal infection readily masked appendicitis and hepatitis, various poisoning - Botulinum toxin, poisonous plants or mushrooms, the products of combustion. The timely and correct diagnosis depends on the health and sometimes the life of man. 

What you need to find out and pass the doctors?

1 What people eat in the next 72 hours (sausage, mushrooms, fish, unknown plants, unwashed fruits and vegetables, food in catering, etc.).

2 When started deterioration and if it continues, is there any relief from the stool or vomit, permanent or temporary.

3 What man vomits (food, and if so, what kind), water, bile and gastric juice, feces, blood, "coffee grounds", "dry") and how many times. If the child is sick and there is a suspicion that he could eat a poisonous plant, medicines or household chemicals - save vomit before the arrival of the doctor.

4 The number and nature of bowel movements - unformed stools, loose stools, chair of the "rice water", with mucus, "green", blood gases, undigested food, urging "dry".

5. hurts whether stomach, and if so, how much.

6 The temperature is increased, decreased or normal.

7 Are there any signs of dehydration (dry, loose skin, dry chapped lips and mouth, weakness, difficulty urinating, dark, foul-smelling urine).

8 Are there any signs of liver damage (yellow whites of the eyes, pale stool, dark urine), kidney (blood in the urine, difficulty urinating), brain (confusion, delirium).

9 Is there a rash, bruising?

10 Are there any other symptoms, blurred vision, hearing, coordination, etc.?

11 Does the patient to eat and drink?

12 ill illness with similar symptoms if someone from the family or people having dinner with the patient in the next few days?

If the patient has a relatively mild stomach, vomiting and diarrhea occurred 2-3 times per day, there is no temperature, dehydration and other symptoms, it's probably food poisoning or a mild form of the OCI.

If the patient has mild stomach, severe nausea, frequent vomiting, and weakness - most likely it is rotavirus.

"Greens" and blood streaks in the stool usually indicates dysentery.

Fever, delirium and rapid deterioration characteristic of typhoid.

Hard, painful abdomen, combined with painful vomiting, evidence of inflammation in the abdominal cavity - maybe it's appendicitis, peritonitis. But the final diagnosis can only be a doctor.

Self-Treatment

Self-treatment of DCI is possible, but quite risky. If you are sure that the case in yesterday's sausage or plums dirty faced similar disorders before and feel relatively well - no fever, painful vomiting or weakness, rash, severe pain and other unusual symptoms - try to treat yourself. However, in children younger than 3 years old, adults over 60 years of age, in patients suffering from immune disorders, heart disease, gastrointestinal tract, liver and kidney, hypertension, etc., while the disease several family members, a sharp deterioration, lack of improvement within 3 days, symptoms of the disease after the tours to countries in Africa or Asia, the southern republics of the former Soviet Union, or after contact with the people there, a doctor's consultation is required!

The first thing to do in cases of suspected food poisoning or OCI - to induce vomiting after drinking 0,3-0,5litra 1% soda solution or plain warm water, and pushing it to the root of the tongue. Then you need an enema - this will speed up the cleaning of the body and "wash" dangerous bacteria. After cleaning, please pack activated charcoal or enterosorbent - this will help absorb and bring the remaining toxins. Without a prescription should not be used with antibiotics, analgesics, anti-emetic and powerful means of diarrhea - listed drugs may aggravate the disease and mitigate the symptoms!

Main home remedy against OCI - diet. 12-24 hours is better to completely abandon the food. Then, you can eat some congee, porridge without butter, sugar and milk, blueberry jelly, weak chicken broth with white crackers. Within 3-7 days worth of eating porridge without milk (except barley), cakes and meatballs steamed, boiled vegetables (except cabbage and beets), baked apples, stewed (no prunes), dried white bread, low-fat yogurt. Then slowly return to the familiar food.

Drink during OCI need very often - dehydration is dangerous. Poite patient every hour, little by little, so as not to throw up. Let black weak tea, chamomile tea and broth blueberries with sugar. Cases of severe vomiting needs saline: a teaspoon of salt, 4 tablespoons of sugar, 1.5 tablespoons of baking soda dissolved in a liter of water, boil for 2-3 minutes and give 2-3 tablespoons every half hour. Useful for wiping the patient, put him in a warm bath.

To avoid irritation and secondary infections should rinse your mouth with soda or herbs, lubricate the anus of sea buckthorn oil, if the skin begins to dry - use a cream.

The patient should have a separate dishes, his linen and clothes should be washed separately, after caring for them need to wash your hands. Vomit and stool recommended to pour bleach.

Food poisoning and uncomplicated OCI patient should be easier in a day or two after the onset of symptoms, complete recovery occurs in 7-10 days. Is deteriorating, new symptoms, blood, seizures, etc. be sure to consult a doctor.