Diverticular Colitis

NABO, I haven't heard of such a thing. Sorry, I wish I could be more helpful. One of the moderators here, Red 34, has diverticulitis and UC and she would probably find this interesting, she's on vacation for a few days. Diverticulitis runs in my family.

NABO...what you are describing is as Sam says...ischemic colitis.

Do you have diverticulosis?

q

Here is some information I found on line:

Diverticular disease–associated segmental colitis is a unique variant of chronic colitis limited to segments of the left colon that harbor diverticula. Histologically, this disease mimics chronic idiopathic inflammatory bowel disease and can be indistinguishable from ulcerative colitis or Crohn’s colitis on histologic grounds alone. Patients typically present with hematochezia and cramping abdominal pain, and colonoscopic evaluation reveals inflammatory changes limited to the segment of bowel containing the diverticula, with rectal sparing. Although this disease does not appear to be an unusual form of diverticulitis but possibly an immunologically mediated process, many patients respond to treatment directed toward diverticulitis. A subset of patients requires immunosuppressive therapy and/or surgery, and a small subset progresses to develop classic ulcerative colitis.

Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology
Volume 5, Issue 1 , Pages 27-31, January 2007

Never heard of it. I have diverticulosis with no symptoms.When you have symptoms it is called diverticular disease. My dad had serious diverticulitus which is infected diverticula. He had his sigmoid segment removed and not a problem since.

diverticular colitus sounds like it is a symptom of diverticular disease and hence curable. You do not get colitus away from the area with diverticuli. Or maybe not.

If you read this whole link, you start wondering how many colitises there are and how much they really know about colitis. Gets more and more confusing.



www.uptodate.com/contents/diverticular-colitis

NABO....what exactly did the doc say regarding what he saw that lead him to say diverticular colitis.

Regardless of what an article states that it is...I'm wanting to know what it is that the doc says is going on.  Hence we're asking if you have diverticulosis, etc.

Ischemic colitis is a separate issue as is UC...so lots going on with you.  . 

When are you going back for the results of your biopsies? 

q

q: Remembering that I was just coming out of anesthesia I will try to recall what Dr. said.

He said you have a small area of inflammation with ulcers on the left side of your colon. This has not changed since you last colonoscopy (3 years ago). What you have is diverticular colitis. He said that recently there is a realization that some patients diagnosed with UC really have diverticular colitis. He said that this is not an autoimmune disease and could be caused by inadequate blood flow to a portion of the colon usually on the left side of the colon. He said that the treatment is the same as UC.

He also said that the rest of the colon is fine but he took some pieces for biopsies as precaution. He expects them to be negative. He said that he will mail the results to me and if they are negative, I will have my next colonoscopy in five years. I question the five years, but he said that from my history he determined that five years is sufficient.

No mention of rectal involvement.

Thanks for the info re: UC with diverticulosis.

After my last C-Scope in February, my GI said I had UC in remission, and diverticulosis. That made sense to me as since my UC went into remission, the only symptoms I had was some lower abdominal pain, sometimes severe enough to need one or two Percocet per day, but usually not.

Then my PCP prescribed a course of Cipro for a UTI, and the pain went away. I speculated that my diverticula had abscessed, and the Cipro cleared that up. My GI did not dispute this, so I think it was pretty close.

I’m due for a follow-on appointment with my GI, so I’ll be sure to ask him about this. From what I’ve seen here and in the links, I’m pretty sure I’d rather have diverticular colitis than ulcerative colitis.

NABO, how've you been doing with your diverticular colitis?