Crohns Disease

nuttyslack its the nature of the beast eh……at least we can still live to fight another day…..im off to spain in a week for some R&R(if we get my daughters passport)but thats another stressfull story…..

LOL – good luck!

3. Restorative proctocolectomy i.e no 2 but making the “J pouch” with no permanent stoma (would still need temporary stoma to allow the pouch to heal).
At 41, if it was me i would go for no 2.

No 3 can work but significant complications if it goes wrong which is not that infrequent. TBH not as many done these days.

Not exactly correct – pouch would be what most with UC go for, safe in the majority, now done ‘keyhole’ a lot of the time too. Get somebody who has done plenty and you should get a good result.

It was and is exactly correct; most people with UC do NOT get a pouch….

although i do agree with the fact that if you do go for a pouch make sure that they do a reasonable number of them and don’t be afraid to ask for their leak/failure rate which as I said is not insignificant.

In my experience the majority of patients who have surgery for UC i.e. pan-proctocolectomy, in however many stages, will have a pouch reconstruction. Very few opt for a permanent ileostomy.
Pouch surgery is considered safe, although it is important to be well informed pre-operatively re the pros and cons. I agree that a pouch may not be for everybody.
Fewer pouches are probably done now as more patients are treated medically with reasonable success. There is no suggestion that we are moving away from pouch surgery due to excessive complications. Probably the opposite in fact as this type of surgery has been performed since the mid 80’s and long term results seem very good.

I’ve had UC for about 6 years now, reading about everyone on here makes me realise how lucky I am with mine, It’s pretty much under control with Azathioprine and asacol and barely affects me day to day, doesn’t make me tired, I can pretty much do what I like. I really feel for anyone who’s quality of life get affected by it, which is most sufferers it seems.