The Cause of IBS

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As talked about sometime ago, irritable bowel syndrome is believed to be caused by the abnormal behaviour (dysfunction) of the organ muscles of ones gastrointestinal tract or the nerves controlling the organs. The nervous control of the gastrointestinal tract, however, is in fact very complex. There is a system of nerves running theentire length of the gastrointestinal tract right from the oesophagus to the anus in the muscular walls of the organs. These nerves communicate with the other nerves that travel to and from the spinal cord. Nerves within the spinal cord, in turn, are connected to and from the brain. (The gastrointestinal tract is exceeded in the numbers of nerves it contains only by the spinal cord and brain.) Thus, the unnatural function of the nervous system in IBS may also occur in a the brain, the gastrointestinal muscular organ, or the spinal cord.

The system of nerves that is in control the gastrointestinal organs, as with most other organs, contains both motor and sensory nerves. The sensory nerves are continuously sensing what is happening within the organ and carries this information to nerves in the organ's wall. From there, information can be relayed to the spinal cord and brain. The information is received and processed in the organ's wall, the brain or the spinal cord. Then, based on this sensory information and the way the information, commands are sent to the organ with the motor nerves. Two of the most common motor responses in the intestine are relaxation or contraction of the muscle of the organ and secretion of mucus and/or fluid into the organ.

Unnatural function of the nerves of the gastrointestinal organs, as mentioned above, theoretically at least, might also occur in the spinal cord, brain or the organ. Besides, the abnormalities might happen in the sensory nerves, the motor nerves, or at processing centres in the intestine, spinal cord, or brain.

Some people studying argue that the cause of any functional disease is anomalies in the function of the motor nerves. For example, abnormal signals through the motor nerves may produce painful contractions of the muscles. Yet others will argue that unnaturally functioning processing centres are responsible for functional diseases because they misinterpret the usual sensations or relay unusual signals to the organ. In fact, some functional diseases may be due to sensory and/or motor dysfunction. Some others could be caused by abnormalities within the processing centres.

Other people studying will argue that the cause of functional diseases is abnormalities in the function of the sensory nerves. Normal activities, as an example, the expanding of the small intestine by food, may give rise to abnormal sensory signals that are relayed to the brain via the spinal cord, where they are perceived as pain.

Another area that is now receiving a lot of scientific attention is the probable role of gas produced by the bacteria in the intestine in patients with IBS. Studies have shown that people with IBS produce larger amounts of gas than individuals without irritable bowel syndrome, and the gas is possibly retained longer in the small intestine. In people with IBS, abdominal size increases during the day, it reaches a maximum in the evening and coming back to a baseline by the following morning. In people that do not have irritable bowel syndrome, there is no increase in their abdominal size during this period.
There has been much controversy over the role that poor digestion and/or absorption of dietary sugars may play in the aggravation of the symptoms of IBS. Poor absorption of the sugar in milk, is commonplace as is poor digestion of fructose, a sweetener put into a lot of processed foods. Poor digestion of these sugars may well aggravate the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome since unabsorbed sugars quite often cause increased formation of gas.

Although these abnormalities in the producing of and transport of gas may give rise to some of the symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome, much more testing will need to be done before it becomes clear that intestinal gas plays a role in IBS.

Dietary fat in healthy individuals can cause food as well as gas to move slowly through the stomach and small intestine. Some people with IBS may even respond to dietary fat in an exaggerated fashion with greater slowing. Thus, dietary fat could and probably does aggravate the symptoms of IBS.

Article Source: http://depositarticles.com/

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