Irritable Bowel Syndrome A Case Study
NATIONAL JOURNAL OF HOMOEOPATHY 1995 Jul / Aug Vol IV No 4.
Manjaramker D P.
Cases.
` Arg-n.

A female patient aged 35 years, came with following complaints, present for last 3 years.

1. Painless watery motions 8-10 times daily, having no specific time modality.
2. Palpitation, nervousness, with perspiration of palms and soles.
3. Tingling and numbness of extremities.
4. Abdominal cramps with flatulent distention.

History: Relatives gave the history that whenever patient is anxious, angry, or mentally depressed due to quarrel, problems of children or any socio-emotional problems, she gets painless diarrhoea.

Patient had already taken extensive treatment in modern medicine without any positive result. Finally, went to Apollo Hospital at Hyderabad only to get her disease labelled as "Irritable Bowel Syndrome". Anti depressants given without any result. Ultimately, she decided to try Homoeopathy.

No history of amoebic colitis, no past history of major illness. Menstrual History - NAD. No history of PID. Obstetric history - 4 FTND.

Clinical Examination: General condition good, Pulse 80-min, BP 130-90 mm of Hg. Respiration 20-min, Anaemia (+), Tongue - Clear. No significant lymphadenopathy.

Mentally the patient is fearful and nervous. Fear of serious disease.

CNS - Normal
CVS - Normal
RS - Normal
Appetite - Good
Desires - Pungent food but it aggravates complaints. She is a total vegetarian.
Abdominal Examination: Soft and distended. Liver, spleen not palpable. USG, Colonoscopy, sigmoidoscopy reports normal. Stool report normal except mucus ++ fat globules (+++).

Homoeopathic view:

Considering the totality of symptoms : loose motions associated with the mental state of patient, the drug of choice was Argentum-nitricum. Rectum, diarrhoea, excitement KR pg.612 only Arg-nit is in 3 marks.

After comparing with similar drugs like Gels, Phos-acid and Thuja, (2 marks each) I decided on Argentum-nit by using the eliminating symptoms.

Treatment:

Arg-nit 200 BD for 3 days and SL for 10 days.
15 days later: Better (3+). SL for 15 days.
After one month - Arg-nit 1M 1 dose.
Now patient is totally free of symptoms and only on SL.
With the Homoeopathic treatment I also gave Psychotherapy. This helped her to regain confidence and she was also trained to control her bowel habits.

Conclusion: Irritable bowel syndrome can be defined as a motility disorder that is modified by psychosocial factors. This syndrome has a variety of names i.e. irritable colon, spastic colitis, mucus colitis, nervous diarrhoea etc. Irritable bowel syndrome is a common disorder. Generally 50 percent of the patients who come to doctor with gastrointestinal complaints can be classified in this category. Female: Male ratio in Western countries is 2:1 and in India it is 1:2.

Psycho-physiological correlation: Although motility pattern of increase and decrease has been observed in normal persons as well as in irritable bowel syndrome patients, very little work has been done to correlate the psychological status with the physiological status. For eg. for some people, sudden fright or shocking news leads to loose motion and other symptoms of irritable bowel syndrome.

These patients are generally nervous, hysterical, neurotic, neurasthenic, anxious or depressed. Case history reveals stressful situations in life, for such patients. Hence they get great relief by psychotherapy. So you must:

1. Identify the current stress that precipitated the symptoms.
2. Advise change of environment - if possible.
3. Give intensive psychoanalysis aimed at alteration and modification of life style of patient.