Blood in my 4-year-old's diarrhoea - help!

[Oodle]

My four year old son has had loose poo for a long time - maybe always. I put it down to the fact that he eats lots of fruit, but it seemed to get worse - runnier, going about four times a day - a few months ago, so I took him to the doctor. She said she thought he was fine - lively, growth fine, weight fine (around 50th percentile, maybe a bit less - we are both quite tall though) and agreed it was probably the fruit.

However, about six weeks ago he had blood in his poo. Panic stations. Took him back, doctor did a stool test for infections which has come back negative. He has now been referred to a specialist at the Chelsea and westminster hospital for the end of Jan. Since then we've noticed blood a couple of times and once some sort of mucus/pale pink stuff.

I am really worried. Have been reading about coeliac disease and also Crohn's/inflammatory bowel disease which totally terrifies me. The thing is, he seems fine in himself, apart from the loose poos. We did cut out wheat for a day or two and the poos were less frequent so perhaps it is gluten intolerance/coeliac disease? Does anyone have a similar experience or any advice to stop me ruining our christmas with worry?

Thanks so much!

Hi Oodle!

I'd be worried too. But...it's not very likely to be Crohn's Disease (or other forms of IBD). I suffer from that condition and the age of diagnosis only really tends to be from 15 upwards. However the National Association for Crohn's and Colitis (NACC) has a good website and a free phone support line so it might be worth having a look there. Don't be terrified though.

If you're thinking about coeliac disease again there's a good assocation (sorry, brain-dead tonight, can't remember the name). It's worth going back to the doctor with the new occurences of blood / mucus and asking if tests for coeliac would be good. If you're not happy with the response you get from the doc, keep going back, keep communicating and keep asking for what you think is best.

Start a diary of anything that concerns you, date each occurence and note the details so that you can start to see any pattern. If you can, start a food diary for your ds and see if any correlation between food and symptoms starts to emerge. Also keep an eye on his energy levels and see if there's any link to either food or symptoms, and also ask him if he finds it painful to go to the loo and note down any pain he has (without scaring the poor boy). This will really help the doctor to understand what's going on.

Try not to worry - I know it's human nature to! Good luck.

Thanks Roseylea, you've made me feel better. I am a big worrier. However, there was more blood in his poo tonight - a proper trickle. Not diarrhoea either - two proper formed 'stools' although bulky and floaty (sorry if too much information!) His poo never smells bad though, and he's not pale, lacking in energy, small etc which seem to be signs of coeliac disease. So can't think of anything else it could be if not coeliac or an infection - other than crohn's or IBD. But he doesn't have pain either - just a little ache afterwards if the poo is particularly runny. x

Let us know how it goes. I LOL @ 'too much information'! As a Crohn's patient I can assure that there is no such thing as TMI sometimes! It's important that you do describe symptoms exactly as they (esp. to your doc) so that you get whatever advice the doc can give you.

Keeping my finges crossed for you and your ds.

I don't know much about Crohns or Coeliac disease but, loose stools with mucous followed by blood may be also due to allergies/intolerance.

In our experience, you only get to the blood stage if you have been eating the offending food repeatedly for several days in a row, and stoping it normally gets the stools back to normal in a few weeks.

DS had an ELISA test (York Test). It is not very reliable and a bit expensive but available to order without having to wait for ages for an apointment with the allergician.

The good thing is that you get to check many things from a single blood sample. We used it and then ordered a more reliable test for the things that came with higher scores. As I said, we were told it was a waste of money but if DS had not had that test done we would have never realised he was allergic to so many things, armed with that info we pushed for RAST and skin prick tests for the most offensive foods which confirmed the findings and since then.... I have a different child, much happier and healthy.

has the doc ruled out ameboic dysentry?

people with allergies are at a high risk of catching this , as well as fungel infections BTW !