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Melena is considered a medical emergency as it arises from a significant amount of bleeding. Urgent care is required to rule out serious causes and prevent potentially life-threatening emergencies. A less serious, self-limiting case of melena can occur in newborns two to three days after delivery, due to swallowed maternal blood. [citation needed]
Blood in stool looks different depending on how early it enters the digestive tract—and thus how much digestive action it has been exposed to—and how much there is. The term can refer either to melena, with a black appearance, typically originating from upper gastrointestinal bleeding; or to hematochezia, with a red color, typically originating from lower gastrointestinal bleeding. [6]
Hyperviscosity syndrome is a group of symptoms triggered by an increase in the viscosity of the blood.Symptoms of high blood viscosity include spontaneous bleeding from mucous membranes, visual disturbances due to retinopathy, and neurologic symptoms ranging from headache and vertigo to seizures and coma.
A complete blood count as well as an hemoglobin test should be performed when a patient presents symptoms of hematochezia. A colonoscopy may be necessary if there is suspicion of bleed from colon particularly in the elderly to look for the site and many causes of bleed like carcinoma, ulcerative colitis, rectal varices or other lesions and in certain instances upper gastrointestinal endoscopy ...
The length of the small intestine can vary greatly, from as short as 2.75 m (9.0 ft) to as long as 10.49 m (34.4 ft). [6] On average it is about 6.1 m (20 ft). [ 1 ] Due to this variation it is recommended that following surgery the amount of bowel remaining be specified rather than the amount removed.
[1] [10] Other symptoms may include fever, abdominal pain, and a feeling of incomplete defecation. [2] [6] [11] Complications may include dehydration. [3] The cause of dysentery is usually the bacteria from genus Shigella, in which case it is known as shigellosis, or the amoeba Entamoeba histolytica; then it is called amoebiasis. [1]
Fecal occult blood testing (FOBT), as its name implies, aims to detect subtle blood loss in the gastrointestinal tract, anywhere from the mouth to the colon.Positive tests ("positive stool") may result from either upper gastrointestinal bleeding or lower gastrointestinal bleeding and warrant further investigation for peptic ulcers or a malignancy (such as colorectal cancer or gastric cancer).
Neonatal alloimmune thrombocytopenia (NAITP, NAIT, NATP or NAT) is a disease that affects babies in which the platelet count is decreased because the mother's immune system attacks her fetus' or newborn's platelets. A low platelet count increases the risk of bleeding in the fetus and newborn.