I have had both Ulcerative Colitis and MS, the former remedies by a panproctocolectomy with end ileostomy, that to you is removal of my entire colon and anus, with end of small intestine (ileum) brought to surface of lower abdomen as an easily manageable stoma which discharges waste neatly into a small empty-able bag. I have always been very curious to know if there is a connection and what that connection might be.
What is Ulcerative Colitis?
UC is one of the two main forms of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), the other being Crohns. Like MS, IBD is becoming commoner, and affects the same demographics as those most affected by MS. UC is an inflammation of the mucous membrane layer of the colon, often the entire organ is affected as in my case. There is a genetic factor, an environmental factor and dietary factor that sets it off to begin with. I know I was given early antibiotics, aged one week, my mother was given the drug DES as I’ve posted before, I was not able to be breastfed and received undoubtedly a very unhealthy dietary start, such was the 1960s.
The inflammation in colitis usually makes itself most noticed initially by its presence at the lower end of the colon, with episodes of passing blood, often a lot of stringy mucus, a feeling you perpetually have to visit the bathroom, a sense of heaviness and aching and sometimes bad pain in lower left side, and a mixture of sometimes severe constipation and usually mild diarrhoea. It’s quite distinct from a “tummy bug”, although one always tries to ascribe it to such initially. With modern travel we might consider first a peculiar tropical disease.
Mayo Clinic – Ulcerative Colitis
As the entire colon gets affected, severe diarrhoea and quite some blood loss can evolve, the colon becomes sort of scarred, and there’s increasing risk of a particularly aggressive form of bowel cancer. Monitoring can greatly reduce this risk. In my case the colitis flares became unpredictable and severe, during last hospitalisation I was considered for an emergency colectomy to prevent rupture of colon with resulting sepsis. I was having complications like pyoderma gangrenosum (a severe skin complication where skin dies down to fat layer) and autoimmune arthritis. I was living under the Sword of Damocles and went for an elective colectomy and never looked back with regard to that part of my health story.
The connection with MS
UC can be quite “spectacular” with the blood loss, social embarrassment, and repeat hospitalisations, and because I had so many complications, reporting neuro symptoms just raised belief that they were caused as part of the complications, rather than being a significant entity in itself. Indeed initially my UC was put down to “IBS with haemorrhoids”, lack of dietary fibre, or whatever was convenient for the doctor to say. I had to be doubled over, passing significant amounts of blood, before I got seen to by a gastroenterologist and diagnosed very quickly. As a matter of fact haemorrhoids are almost inevitable in a person with IBD for obvious reasons.
The connection between UC and MS is becoming ever more evident. It is believed that Ulcerative Colitis drives Multiple Sclerosis rather than the other way around. So, in such people who have UC, the risk of MS is increased. So, to me, it seems my MS is most likely a secondary process to UC.
Read for yourself…
MS Martine: a life with Multiple Sclerosis 