Normally, the surfaces of tissues and organs inside the abdominal cavity are smooth to prevent them from sticking together during body movement. Intestinal adhesion refers to abnormal adhesion between the intestinal tube and the intestinal tube, peritoneum, or other organs in the abdominal cavity caused by various reasons, including primary and secondary types.
What are the causes of intestinal adhesions?
Primary intestinal adhesions are relatively rare and are mostly caused by congenital developmental abnormalities. The vast majority of intestinal adhesions are secondary, and common causes include abdominal surgery, abdominal organ injury, inflammation, infection, tumor infiltration, and other factors.
Abdominal surgery is the most common cause of intestinal adhesions, occurring in 93% of patients undergoing abdominal surgery. Excessive intestinal exposure, violent operations during surgery, large surgical wounds, bleeding in the surgical area, and abdominal infection can all lead to the deposition of fibrin bundles and the formation of adhesions.
What are the main symptoms of intestinal adhesions?
The clinical manifestations of intestinal adhesion vary depending on the degree and location of adhesion. Mild cases may not feel any discomfort, or may occasionally experience mild abdominal pain, bloating, etc. after eating. Patients with severe intestinal adhesions may experience frequent episodes of abdominal pain, bloating, difficulty in defecation, acid reflux, belching, and other digestive tract discomforts, and may even cause intestinal obstruction.
How to treat intestinal adhesion?
Asymptomatic or mild intestinal adhesion does not require special treatment, only daily diet control. When patients develop intestinal obstruction due to intestinal adhesion, timely treatment is required, including symptomatic conservative treatment and surgical treatment. Conservative treatment includes: fasting water, indwelling gastrointestinal tube for gastrointestinal decompression, preventing abdominal infection, inhibiting gastric acid secretion, antispasmodic and analgesic, intravenous nutrition, maintaining water and electrolyte balance, etc.
If conservative treatment is ineffective, surgical treatment should be selected in time to prevent the condition from progressing to strangulating intestinal obstruction. Surgery includes open intestinal adhesiolysis or laparoscopic intestinal adhesiolysis. If the adhesions are dense and cannot be separated, the adhesions need to be removed.
What is the prognosis for patients with intestinal adhesions?
Patients with asymptomatic or mild intestinal adhesions generally have a good prognosis. Most symptomatic intestinal adhesions can be relieved by symptomatic and conservative treatment. If intestinal necrosis and perforation occur secondary to intestinal strangulating obstruction, it may be life-threatening.
How to prevent intestinal adhesions?
The formation of intestinal adhesions is part of the body’s healing mechanism and cannot be completely avoided. However, some methods can be used to reduce the degree of intestinal adhesions.
For doctors, reducing unnecessary turning of the intestinal tube during surgery, using laparoscopic surgery as much as possible (to avoid exposure of the intestinal tube) when conditions permit, adequately hemostasis, and thoroughly flushing the surgical area to avoid residual infection can reduce the chance of adhesion to a certain extent.
For patients, it is also possible to get out of bed early after surgery, have a regular daily routine, exercise appropriately, eat more vegetables and fruits and other foods rich in dietary fiber, eat less fried and meaty foods, avoid overeating, and keep the abdomen warm. Reduce the complications of intestinal adhesion.
