If you suffer from chronic abdominal pain and severe diarrhea as well as fatigue and unexplained weight loss, you may have Crohn’s disease.
What is Crohn’s disease?
Crohn’s disease is an inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) that causes chronic inflammation in your digestive tract. Although Crohn’s disease mostly affects the small intestine and colon, it can also affect different parts of your digestive tract.
When your digestive tract is inflamed, you develop symptoms such as:
Your symptoms can range in severity, and if left untreated Crohn’s disease may spread into the deepest layers of your bowel tissue and lead to painful, debilitating, and potentially life-threatening complications.
What causes Crohn’s disease?
While doctors and medical researchers don’t fully understand the cause of Crohn’s disease, they know that genetics and family history contribute to your risk and that the inflammation may be triggered by an infection that over-stimulates your immune system, causing it to attack the cells in your digestive tract.
Some of the risk factors for Crohn’s disease include:
If you are concerned that you might have Crohn’s disease it is important for you to talk to a doctor like Dr. Rubin about your symptoms. When Crohn’s disease and other inflammatory bowel conditions aren’t treated, they can lead to dangerous complications such as bowel obstructions, ulcers, fistulas, even cancer.
© 2024 Park Gastro NYC. All rights reserved.