Posts Tagged ‘Pain’

Expert Patient Programme

Tuesday, October 11th, 2011

Nearly two years ago I wrote to the Secretary of State for Health asking why diverticular disease (DD) was not included with all the other diseases in the National Service Framework (NSF) for long term conditions or the NSF for older people or the ‘Expert Patient’ initiative. The government thought that both NSFs should ensure that all older people receive improved services based around their own individual needs, and in this way DD may well be covered but not specifically. 

The Expert Patient initiative is a new approach to the management of chronic diseases. (more…)

Migraine, the gut and diverticular disease

Tuesday, September 14th, 2010

MIGRAINE AND GUT MALFUNCTION

What has migraine got to do with diverticular disease?”

That was the occasional response when DD sufferers were asked in a survey if they or any blood relative have/did have migraine. However, 42% of females and 29% of males had migraine themselves or a blood relative did. Some noted that they ‘used to have’ migraine. These figures are far higher than the 10% or so incidence of migraine expected at retirement ages. A survey of migraine sufferers in Ireland found that 51% had also been diagnosed with IBS. A survey of people with IBS found a 60% greater prevalence of migraine than in non-IBS controls (1). There was a frequent association between headache, including migraine, and gastrointestinal symptoms (acid reflux, diarrhoea, constipation and nausea) in a Norwegian report (2).

Patients who did not respond to a high fibre diet, who had a single, intermittent abdominal pain were investigated in Leeds (3). Symptoms and family history suggested that 49% of them might have abdominal migraine and 32% of these had typical migraine symptoms during the attack. Mulak (4) noted that migraine and IBS often coexist. (more…)

Pain with diverticular disease

Thursday, September 9th, 2010

In 2001, 230 members of a previous organisation for DD sufferers (NADD) completed a questionnaire about their symptoms. The results are shown in Table 1. (more…)