Delores

 
Delores is a 49 year old woman who is suffering from chronic constipation. For most of her life, she has had bowel movements once every 2-4 days, and needs to use a laxative in order to stay regular. She becomes extremely bloated after even small amounts of food. She also experiences reflux with heavy meals, and notes that she has had to limit the types of foods she eats due to upset stomach, reflux and nausea. Over the past year and a half, she has noticed a decrease in her cognitive function and mental clarity and feels worn out all the time.

She is concerned about her health, and although no blood tests have showed anything wrong thus far, she just doesn’t feel well. She has been to her gastroenterologist, and had an upper GI endoscopy which showed no abnormalities, and she was diagnosed with IBS-C.

After she was able to explain her symptoms to us, we performed a thorough physical examination to assess the abdomen and to quickly screen for neurological impairment. After this, we chose to run two different tests, a breath test to assess for the gas production in Delores’s intestines, and a stool test to detect possible bacterial, parasitic or fungal pathogens and to evaluate her pancreatic and gut immune function.

When we received the test results we discovered that Delores had an elevated methane gas production in her gastrointestinal system. This indicated that an overgrowth of bacteria in Delores’s small intestine was likely contributing to her constipation. Delores had results consistent with small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, also known as SIBO.

Delores’s stool results indicated why she doesn’t tolerate many foods well. Her total secretory IgA was low, indicating that her gut immune function was also impaired. Her stool results also indicated that several species of bacteria were increased above normal levels—consistent with her symptoms and a less than optimal gut microbial picture.

We explained the results in detail to Delores, and recommended dietary and herbal treatment to help normalize the gas production in her intestines. After 2 weeks, the combination of diet and herbs had helped improve her daily bloating and stool symptoms. Within four weeks, the treatment regimen that Delores had helped significantly, and she was having a bowel movement every day, but she still wasn’t quite 100% improved. We chose to continue with treatment for another 4 weeks, and after a 2nd round of medicines, Delores felt between 90 and 100% improved in her GI symptoms. We repeated breath testing, which showed that her methane gas production had returned to normal levels.

Now that she has completed the herbal treatment, and while continuing on with the diet, Delores is experiencing improvements in her energy level and cognitive function. Through the process of changing her diet and learning to eat for lifelong health, she has discovered that fundamentally, her eating habits may play a large role in whether this problem returns. Through treating SIBO, she has set herself up for success and for lifelong health.