Just diagnosed with UC

Hi everyone,

Just got back from the hospital where I had a colonoscopy done by my GI doc. He found inflammation on parts of my colon and told me I had ulcerative colitis. He took biopsies and those results should be back in a week he said.

Just a few questions...

Last year, May 2013, I started having very violent and bloody bowel movements with very sudden onset. Prior to this, I was throwing up every day 2-3 times a day while still eating everything (diet was normal, had normal amounts of meat, etc.). I feel like I was vulnerable to infection and ate something bad. The symptoms were severe, lots of pain, and lots of diarrhea. Went to the hospital, my current GI doc though ulcerative colitis, but most of the other doctors working on me didn't find anything. Took a two week course of vanco, and the symptoms completely cleared up.

One month later, my GI doc did a colonoscopy, and found my colon all clear. Took biopsies and nothing. All was well until the next incident.

Fast forward to February of this year (9 months after original colitis incident, no diagnosis of UC). I got cellulitis in my foot and was treated with cephalexin and clindamycin. Totally fine bowel movements in the hospital, but then as I was discharged (was in the hospital for 4-5 days), next day I got home, I started having bloody stool. No other symptoms at all, just bloody stool. Thought c diff or hemorrhoids. Bloody stool got much worse over the next few months until I started having a change in bowel movements as well as pain and cramping. Lots of blood in my stool consistently. I thought the most likely thing was c diff because I was treated with clindamycin and was also hospitalized for a few days.

My uncle who is a doctor saw me in his office and ordered a stool test and some blood tests. Did those, stool tests came back negative for c diff, but did come back positive for white blood cells. He put me on a two week course of flagyl (500 mg 4x a day) and see what happens. I took the flagyl and the symptoms cleared up after about a week. However, toward the end of the course, I did start bleeding again for some reason. But 2-3 days after the course ended, my symptoms disappeared. There was one day like two weeks later I started having bloody mucus in the stool, but it was really minor. For the most part, I have been 98% free of all symptoms.

My GI doc did the colonoscopy today...about 3-4 weeks after my course of flagyl...and found some inflammation in my colon still. He think its a continuation of my colitis last year, but I don't know about that. He diagnosed me with UC and I am kind of stunned, but I am also confused about if he is right or not.

My questions are this...

1. Can Ulcerative Colitis be diagnosed when it is in remission? If my colon was all clear, and my biopsies came out negative, and the antibiotic (vancomycin) completely stopped all symptoms, is it possible I had UC back then?

2. Can flagyl help UC flares this much? The difference before and after the course of flagyl has been night and day. I was bleeding all the time and had malformed stools, and now my stools form pretty normally and 98% of the time without any blood.

Just confused. I'm wondering about getting a second opinion.

Huh... sounds puzzling. Id be curious to read your colonoscopy report.

Had some inflammation? Where? What extent? Was it continuous or here n there?

Were there any ulcers in the intestines?

Blood diarrhea is def a cause for concern and UC diagnosis... but c.diff sounds more likely to me.

Negative biopsies previously... hmmm. I just have a hard time believing UC.
biopsy results will tell more. And I think a second opinion sounds justified.

Inflammation, blood and diarrhea can be caused by non uc things as well: cdiff, bacterium, etc. So I am hoping we don't have to welcome you to our club. The biopsies along with the visual indications of your colonscopy should confirm or deny uc. Uc starts at the rectum, is continuous and goes upward. Uc includes shallow damage to the intestinal wall, inflammation, and ulcers. Biopsies can confirm.

Before i was officially diagnosed with uc, I had uc like episodes (a bout of diarrhea with blood) that would appear suddenly last a few days or a week and then go away on it's own. This happened once, went away for 3-4 months, appeared again and disappeared, then it happened every 2 months, every month, every couple weeks. You can see the pattern here it, began happening more frequently until the point it never went away, like it did initially, and that's when I finally got the colonoscopy and my uc diagnosis.

When in clinical remission, there are no signs of uc in the patient, even under a microscope, so yes it is possible to be tested and not see uc. Some of us that have had persistent inflammation from uc for years, have noticable damage even when in remission: scaring, disrupted patterns of vessels, polyps, etc. So we'll never look normal.

I don't think the vomiting has anything to do with it as nobody here has said that had anything to do with the onset of uc. The better one is there are a number of people here who had food poisoning (salmonella infection) followed by a course of antibiotics that developed uc shortly there after. Not everybody (not me lol) but some for sure. It is thought that uc has a trigger, or a series of triggers as not everybody has the same trigger.

iPoop - I mentioned vomiting because I was doing it a few times a day, and I would eat meals right after it (my eating disorder anxiety made me act crazy). I hypothesized that my stomach acid was low and made me more susceptible to infection and I ate something bad. My GI doc cut me off and said it doesn't work that way. I respect his knowledge, but I don't know if I trust him on that.

I was so destroyed by the thought of having UC last year, but then the colonoscopy and biopsy were all clear, so I was so relieved. I'm kinda devastated at how this could be happening again. I got cellulitis so randomly. I thought with my circumstances it would be more likely to be c diff...and maybe it still is...but it seems hard to hang onto that with the lack of evidence so far.

DennyRae - Hi! So are you saying that if the biopsies are unconvincing or inconclusive, I should get this blood test you are talking about?

I'm wondering if I should try a course of flagyl again just to see how things go...

Yeah, our symptoms sound kinda similar.

I didn't know how variable this disease could be. I always thought UC was always a severe disease and if you had it, you would KNOW. Maybe not. At least if I have to have UC, it doesn't seem to be that severe so far.