There's no question that constipation is uncomfortable. But sometimes it can be downright dangerous, as detailed in a paper published in BMJ Case Reports this month. As the report explains, a 24-year-old man's colon burst from storing too much feces.
According to the report, the unidentified patient visited the emergency room after experiencing abdominal pain and diarrhea for seven days. This wasn't his first visit: over the past four years, the patient had been admitted to the hospital several times due to chronic constipation. On this occasion, his stomach was bloated and tender, and a CT scan showed his rectum and colon were extremely full of feces. Oral laxatives and enemas were prescribed, but the man refused to take any enemas.
Just two days later, the patient was back in the ER. A second CT scan revealed that feces and air had leaked into the guy's abdomen through a rip in his colon. Doctors repaired the hole during emergency surgery and performed a colostomy, which allows bowel movements to pass through the abdomen into a bag.
To be clear, most constipated people don't suffer such drastic consequences. Doctors believe this patient's case was so extreme because he had chronic megacolon, or an enlarged, hyper-dilated colon. This makes it difficult for the muscles in the intestine to contract, which help feces move more easily.
“This was a very challenging case. This patient had autism spectrum disorder. Chronic constipation is very common in these patients as well as [their] non-compliance with medical advice. It was difficult to get consent to offer elective surgery. The result was bowel perforation and an emergency operation. This was a rare and extreme case,"Alexandros Apostolopoulos, paper co-author and surgeon at Newham University Hospital in London, wrote to Gizmodo.
While this case is undeniably tragic, megacolons are fairly rare, so you likely don't have to worry about the condition. You're much more likely to just suffer from a routine case of constipation: 42 million Americans have trouble pooping at some point each year, according to the National Institute of Health.
Thankfully, constipation can easily be combatted by eating the right foods, such as oatmeal, sweet potatoes and prunes.
