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By contrast, dark red or maroon blood may mean you are bleeding higher up in your colon, ... There are always some outlier causes of blood in your stool as well, Dr. Swaminath says.
Bright blood in stool, dark blood in vomit. Lower gastrointestinal bleeding (LGIB) is any form of gastrointestinal bleeding in the lower gastrointestinal tract. LGIB is a common reason for seeking medical attention at a hospital's emergency department. [1] LGIB accounts for 30–40% of all gastrointestinal bleeding and is less common than upper ...
Blood may be observed in vomit or in altered form as black stool. Depending on the amount of the blood loss, symptoms may include shock. Upper gastrointestinal bleeding can be caused by peptic ulcers, gastric erosions, esophageal varices, and rarer causes such as gastric cancer. The initial assessment includes measurement of the blood pressure ...
Patients with hemosuccus may develop symptoms of gastrointestinal hemorrhage, such as blood in the stools, maroon stools, or melena, which is a dark, tarry stool caused by digestion of red blood cells. They may also develop abdominal pain. It is associated with pancreatitis, pancreatic cancer and aneurysms of the splenic artery.
Blood in stool looks different depending on how early it enters the digestive tract—and thus how much digestive action it has been exposed to—and how much there is. The term can refer either to melena, with a black appearance, typically originating from upper gastrointestinal bleeding; or to hematochezia, with a red color, typically originating from lower gastrointestinal bleeding. [6]
A complete blood count as well as an hemoglobin test should be performed when a patient presents symptoms of hematochezia. A colonoscopy may be necessary if there is suspicion of bleed from colon particularly in the elderly to look for the site and many causes of bleed like carcinoma, ulcerative colitis, rectal varices or other lesions and in certain instances upper gastrointestinal endoscopy ...
The stool guaiac test involves fasting from iron supplements, red meat (the blood it contains can turn the test positive), certain vegetables (which contain a chemical with peroxidase properties that can turn the test positive), and vitamin C and citrus fruits (which can turn the test falsely negative) for a period of time before the test.
Gastrointestinal bleeding can range from small non-visible amounts, which are only detected by laboratory testing, to massive bleeding where bright red blood is passed and shock develops. Rapid bleeding may cause syncope. [ 18 ] The presence of bright red blood in stool, known as hematochezia, typically indicates lower gastrointestinal bleeding.