Bowel obstruction

[flowergirl]

bowel obstruction

this actually isn't a post about me for once!

my husband's uncle was diagnosed with UC a few years ago. he had a temporary ileostomy? and has been on cipro/flagyl since then and has seemed to keep it under control.
earlier this week he had an incident at work and ended up with 2nd degree burns on his face and arms from a gas line explosion. not fun. he was in the hospital for a couple days and came home. then started having bad stomach pains.
apparently he has a bowel obstruction in his small bowel.

my questions are: i assume that if he has an obstruction in his small bowel that he can't just have UC, since that's only in the colon, right?

could the inflammation response from the burns have triggered this? or maybe just exacerbated it to a point that it showed up now?

will he probably end up having to have surgery? i don't know much about the surgery aspects of crohn's, i've never had any actual problems in my intestines, only the mouth and rectum.

thanks guys!

 

[Cat-a-Tonic]

Hi Flower, I'm just guessing here, but the obstruction might have formed at the area where his ileostomy was? Where they re-attached the intestines together after removing the temp ileostomy, scar tissue could have formed there causing narrowing or a stricture, and maybe that's the area that's obstructed? That's the only scenario I can think of where he'd have UC but a small bowel obstruction. As for surgery, I also don't know - I would guess they might watch him closely and see if it clears on its own, and if it doesn't then they'd probably operate. I haven't had experience with obstructions or surgery myself so these are just total guesses! I hope he is okay and gets better soon. Hopefully someone else with more experience in these matters will see this thread and give you a better reply.

 

[flowergirl]

i'm just a little worried about him. before he had the ileostomy he was on something... i can't remember what it was. maybe imuran or something, and he ended up with a permanent condition that affects his nerves. i think because of that remicade isn't an option for him. i don't know about other drugs.

 

[flowergirl]

so good news about the uncle. it wasn't an obstruction. he had intestinal trauma paralysis from the accident/all the pain meds. he's home now and eating. :soledance: