My 5-year old daughter was diagnosed with Crohn's disease in January of this year. She had been having loose, sometimes watery stools several times a day in the months before she was diagnosed. She never complained of pain. If she had not gotten a bad bacterial infection on top of the Crohn's, we may not have found it as early as we did. Our doctor's were very aggressive because she had become malnourished and was very sick.
She spent a week in the hospital and was started on Prednisone, Cipro, and Flagyl. We were strongly encouraged to put her on Remicade immediately, but decided to try a more holistic approach. She was weaned off the Prednisone over the course of 6 weeks and has been drug-free for over 6 weeks now.
We saw the peds GI specialist today and have scopes scheduled for 2 weeks so that they can check on her progress. She has had solid, well formed stools since February. She only goes to the bathroom once a day or once every other day. No mucus or blood visible. She has grown 2 inches since January (1 inch since our last visit 6 weeks ago). Her energy level and appetite are good.
The doc really can't believe it and says it is definitely not typical for kids to do so well, so quickly. That is why we are doing the scopes. They also want to do another small bowel follow-through and/or an abdominal MRI.
I'm hopeful that we can get all of these tests done and they'll say "yeah, she's in remission". It would be nice not to have to endure more tests and frequent office visits.
So, my question is.....what does remission look like? I don't think she would be growing or having normal poop if she wasn't getting considerably better, do you?
She spent a week in the hospital and was started on Prednisone, Cipro, and Flagyl. We were strongly encouraged to put her on Remicade immediately, but decided to try a more holistic approach. She was weaned off the Prednisone over the course of 6 weeks and has been drug-free for over 6 weeks now.
We saw the peds GI specialist today and have scopes scheduled for 2 weeks so that they can check on her progress. She has had solid, well formed stools since February. She only goes to the bathroom once a day or once every other day. No mucus or blood visible. She has grown 2 inches since January (1 inch since our last visit 6 weeks ago). Her energy level and appetite are good.
The doc really can't believe it and says it is definitely not typical for kids to do so well, so quickly. That is why we are doing the scopes. They also want to do another small bowel follow-through and/or an abdominal MRI.
I'm hopeful that we can get all of these tests done and they'll say "yeah, she's in remission". It would be nice not to have to endure more tests and frequent office visits.
So, my question is.....what does remission look like? I don't think she would be growing or having normal poop if she wasn't getting considerably better, do you?
