And while I'm trying to think of every possible topic to cover about ulcerative colitis, there will probably be things I miss. So if you have any questions at all about what life is like with ulcerative colitis, or if you've had colitis and want to know how I've lived differently than you, send me an email and I'll answer as quick as possible, maybe even with a video!

The first surgery went excellent and three months later, part 2. Technically, I could've lived and functioned after the first surgery--I just would've had an ileostomy my whole life (which wouldn't be the worst thing in the world). The second surgery was more demanding as it involved the reconstruction of a pseudo-rectum out of my intestine. That was three weeks ago yesterday, and I'm going great, much better at this point then after my first surgery.

Soon after I get some of these testimony videos out of the way, I'm going to begin posting videos about how I manage my stoma, and man, are there a lot of topics to cover! I'm going to focus on the stoma videos for now since time is running on out me! In less than three months, I'm going to have my takedown surgery and then no more stoma! It might be a sad day, believe it or not.

A couple other things, I added an About page and Contact page today. Feel free to send me an email or contact me through replying to my posts. I'm surprised at the number of people talking to me already, even though this site hasn't been here for much longer than a week.

If you have a blog about ulcerative colitis, or really any other bowel disease, send it on to me and I'll post your link! I'm slowly gathering a collection of links myself...be sure to check out others' pages and support them in their fight against ulcerative colitis!

Hey everybody, as promised, a video detailing my first surgery because of ulcerative colitis. But I'm not out of the water yet! More surgeries and trials to come. Continue watching as I have much more to share with everybody. And tell your friends about this site too! I think it could be especially useful for people considering surgery themselves.

A little preview, things get much better for me!

As promised, this video describes my second major flare up with ulcerative colitis. It was much worse than the first time, quite unbelievable how bad it got.

And to note, for those who want to watch the videos in high quality, click on the player to be transported to my YouTube page. Then, in the bottom right of the YouTube player, click watch in high quality.

Here's a video that all with colitis can relate to: the first flare up. It truly was the most frustrated and uncertain time in my life because I had no clue what my body was doing to me as I watched my bodily functions regress to that of an infant in a matter of days. Astounding.

The Ulcerative Colitis Vlog has gotten of to a good start, everything's working as it should. Tomorrow I'll post a video describing what happened when my colitis first flared up. Flare ups are the term for what happens when the colitis gets out of control and the condition seriously hampers one's life. It wasn't a pretty time experiencing a flare up, especially since I had no clue how bad it could get. For those who've experienced a flare up themselves, you know what I'm talking about.

My first video! This explains the process it took to be diagnosed with ulcerative colitis. In the coming days and weeks, I'll show what I've gone through, with surgeries, flare-ups, and everything else. Stay tuned and tell your friends about this new site!

Heldigvis er det slik i Norge, at man har opprettet organisasjoner, som er her for å gi bedre svar. Her er det ikke alltid leger og eksperter som står i fokus, men vanlige mennesker som du og meg, som forteller om behandlinger, opplevelser og hva vi har erfart. Ikke minst er det et sted der andre forstår deg, og faktisk VET HVA DU GJENNOMGÅR.

Landsforeningen for fordøyelsessykdommer er en av de største organisasjonene. Her er det mennesker med alle former for IBD i alle aldersgrupper. De har blandt annet samtalegrupper, pizzakvelder, foredrag av forskende leger etc. De har avdelinger i de fleste fylker, og det er bare å gå på websiden for å bli medlem.

Vil du holde deg oppdatert på den medisinske fronten, kan du ta kontakt med ditt lokalsykehus. Her er det også ofte samlinger om ny forskning, og veiledning for dem med Crohn. Her er det også ofte muligheter for medisinprøvingsprogram, om en har hatt dårlig effekt av andre behandlinger og vil prøve noe nytt.

Ultralyd: En enkel undersøkelse der legen smører magen din med en gel, og kan via lydbølgene kanskje se fortykkelser i tarmene.

MR: Magnestresonanstomagrofi, er en undersøkelse der du blir lagt inn i en åpen trommel og plassert i et magnetfelt. Radiobølger blir sendt ut og utløser hydrogene/energi i vevet i organene. Dette gjør at man kan se og skille organer, uten å bruke røntgenståler. Man må som oftest drikke kontrastvæske for å se organene i magen tydelig. Undersøkelsen kan ta alt fra 20 min til en time, og underveis har man intervaller der man må holde pusten.

CT: Computer tomograf er en røntgenundersøkelse. Det fungerer på den måten at en ligger på et åpent bord der røntgenstrålene roterer rundt et visst område. Dette gjør at man får mange vinkler og gode bilder.

Koloskopi: Her starter de med å pumpe opp tarmene dine med luft, og fører inn en fiberoptisk slange med kamera i enden. Ved hjelp av denne kan legene se på en skjerm, hvordan tarmene ser ut. De tar også vevsprøver av tarmene, ved hjelp av en liten streng på slangen. Undersøkelsen kan være litt ubehagelig, men er den sikkreste måten å påvise Crohnpå. Er man under 16 år får man narkose.

Gastroskopi: Samme prinsipp som koloskopi, bare at man svelger slangen, og gir legen mulihet til å se svelg og magesekk. Her blir halsen bedøvd med en spray, og det er som oftest en rask undersøkelse.

Remicade gis intravenøst. Du må altså innlegges for en dag, og den tar minimum fire timer (to timer for å få inn stoffet, og to timer til observasjon når du har fullført behandlingen). Det er mest effektivt å få behandling hver åttende uke.

Det er få bivirkninger med remicade, med det som kan oppstå er; allergiske reaksjoner, bihulebetennelse, halsbetennelse, hodepine, rar smak i munnen og hovne legger (indisier på hjerteinfarkt. Behandlingen må da stoppes.)

Virketiden på behandlingen er gjennomsnittlig fem år. Men man kan vende tilbake til behandlingen etter opphold (ca1,5år) og få samme gode effekt.

Vil du vite mer om det medisinske kan du gå på felleskatalogen her.

Cyrus Krohn has a huge responsibility with GOP.com.  Where do the Republicans go technologically if McCain doesn’t win in November?  GOP.com is definitely a step in the right direction for the Republicans, one that, win or lose, needs to be continually advanced. 

But a few criticisms, if I might…

First, the site takes forever to load (as do other links when I clicked on them), which is an unnecessary frustration.  Those valuable few seconds give me the opportunity to type a different address into my browser and be on my way.  If I want to join the GOP, make a donation to the cause or read some dish about an opponent, don’t give me an excuse not to by taking too long to load the page.

At any given time, visitors might think this is an Obama Web site at first glance: 

Give opponents their due, but chances are that people who visit this site are voting for McCain to begin with.  Obama information is absolutely necessary, but it doesn’t have to be front and center. 

Finding the donation application widget took me two days, four phone calls and an email.  Turns out that the widget isn't even part of GOP.com - it's part of meetbarackobama.com, one of the RNC's other sites that's linked-to from the GOP.com homepage.  Confused yet?  I would suggest making this much easier to find or simply posting it on the homepage.  It’s a great tool, but why is it buried?

The staggering amount of data about voters that is collected, cross-referenced and analyzed is overwhelming but impressive.  I assume that both parties have equally detailed databases.  People tend to feel as if their privacy has been invaded, but it should be no surprise that the bottom line of this technology is money, power and influence – on both sides. 

Of course it’s easier to point out the negatives.  Overall, the site looks great.  It’s networks – Facebook, del.icio.us and digg to name a few - are readily available. The RNC’s YouTube page is richly designed and opens with this video:

But again, all pages seem to take forever to load, which only perpetuates the impression that Republicans are old, stodgy and behind the times. 

Krohn had a right to be proud of the “Republican Platform Committee” page. 

For once in the tech realm, the Republicans had something great and they had it first.  The site is very interactive, allowing for both text and video entries.  It also was a wise call to allow (almost) everything to post.  Nothing should be hidden, especially when internet viewers are lurking in the shadows, ready at a moments notice to jump on an inaccuracy or inconsistency.  Also, the Valentines were funny and unique in their simplicity.  I'd definitely send one out!

Just a few criticisms, but overall, well-done, Republicans.

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Alors pour me faire pardonner et me donner bonne conscience, j'ai pensé à vous parler d'une campagne d'information qui essaie de se faire connaître. Apporter ma contribution à une noble cause quoi !

Bon, ce n'est pas très glamour comme thème, puisque la maladie de Crohn est une maladie du tube digestif... De toute façon, parler de la maladie ou relayer ce genre d'infos c'est pas fait pour le fun mais simplement pour éviter de l'ignorer.

J'étais quand même abasourdie quand j'ai lu sur le site lancé à l'occasion de la campagne d'information : www.vousnetespasseuls.fr , qu'une personne sur 1 000 était touchée en France par cette maladie d'origine inconnue, souvent âgés de 20 à 30 ans...

Voilà la vidéo qui explique tout ça mieux que moi :

[dailymotion id=x4ulkm]

Hay que resaltar, que los pacientes sometidos a este tratamientos, están expuestos a un riesgo importante de sufrir efectos adversos serios, en la que se incluyen infecciones que pueden causar la hospitalización o la muerte del paciente. Esto es debido al efecto que Cimzia tiene sobre el sistema inmune, lo que puede causar que nuestro organismo, no sea capaz de combatir las infecciones. Además, Cimzia es un bloqueador del factor de necrosis tumoral, lo que puede dar lugar a linfomas. No obstante, en los estudios realizados, no se observaron probabilidades mayores de tener tumores, no obstante, el número de pacientes incluídos en los estudios para la aprobación no fueron demasiado grandes, por lo que los los ensayos futuros nos podrán dar una mayor información acerca de la seguridad a largo plazo de Cymzia.

En estos momentos no tengo datos de la postura de la Agencia Europea del Medicamento al respecto de este medicamento, lo cual hace imposible saber cuando podríamos tener este fármaco comercializado en Europa

Dear All,

 I saw Urgelt's video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ld1azzZrfGQon) on probiotics which I thought was very interesting and it made me think of a story I wanted to share but didn't quite know the context of how to do so -- until I saw his video. Alright, so here goes:

Last month, I went to a grand physiology rounds led by the Chief of Gastroenterology, Dr. Thomas Lamont, at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. We talked about a patient who had clostridium difficile colitis -- an inflammed colon -- and I remember distinctly that the patient sadly passed away.

For the patient's treatments, we only discussed antibiotic therapies -- hard-hitting antibiotics like vancomycin and metronidazole that kill nasty bacteria like clostridium difficile. Unfortunately, though, for some patients who relapse, the drugs don't do the job. In these cases, long-term suffering or death is not uncommon.   Such instances make you wonder about the patients' treatment: could there have been a better way?

Back in high school, I had read in a health magazine how probiotics, like the harmless bacteria found in yogurt, were good for serious problems of the gut.  Six years later, I was now in med school -- at a grand physiology rounds no less -- and I had the chance to ask an expert, "why?"

But I was hesitant. Dr. Lamont's a distinguished-looking man in his 60's with a crisp tie and few tufts of white hair.  In medical school, professors with his kind of gravitas tend to think about treatment in strictly four modalities: drugs, chemotherapy, surgery and angiogenesis inhibitors. Probiotics didn't belong in these categories.  In fact, they fell way outside -- somewhere in the territory of Hawaiian yoga and herbal healing centers. The chance he'd know about them?  Tiny.

Or so I thought.  I approached him gingerly and braced myself for a curt response. "Uh, Dr. Lamont, what's your, uh, take on probiotics?" He paused for a moment, contemplating. Meanwhile, my face felt hot. He's just going to think you're a silly student, I thought to myself.

Suddenly, he nodded. "I think probiotics will be one of the frontiers of future research. The gut microbes are a poorly understood area with vast clinical significance if we can understand the mechanisms behind it."

I was startled. I didn't just hear what I heard -- did I?

Lamont continued, "You know, there's this guy in Minnesota who transplants gut flora from one person to another."

Really?

"Yes, through stool transplantation.  What you need is to freeze dry the stool from a family member, administer using an enema."

My mind raced wildly.  What? I didn't quite comprehend what he just told me, but I sensed it was profound. Or profoundly weird. Or both. I wondered for a second whether I was actually in medical school, actually talking to the Chief of Gastroenterology of a famous hospital.

Lamont went on. "You have to understand, it sounds nuts, but there may be a case for that. Healthy people who have never taken a single antibiotic in their lives, can occasionally develop spontaneous ulcerative colitis, which suggests a disruption in the gut flora."

I studied the creases on Lamont's face carefully -- he was all seriousness.  No joke, only complete earnestness.  What he was referring to, after I had time to process it, is that there are trillions of healthy bacteria in our intestines that keep us going. They help us digest, absorb food, protect us from the bad germs. But sometimes, there's an imbalance between the good versus bad bacteria.  When "bad" wins, we get problems like diarrhea, or colitis (inflammatory colon).

When is there an imbalance? Most often it's when people take antibiotics, which kill the good, the bad and the ugly -- altogether and all at the same time. During this vulnerable state, certain bad bacteria like Clostridium difficile can overwhelm the good germs, causing the human host all kinds of complications and even death.

Dr. Lamont explained that most of the time, people only get clostridium difficile complications when they take antibiotics. Yet, there can be rare instances of colitis without antibiotics, which suggest that there's more to the gut flora story than we originally thought there was. For some reason or another, with or without antibiotics, the fine balance between good and bad bacteria can be broken, and stool transplantation might be the last option. It could also be one of the most promising.

                                        ***

That "Minnesota guy" who does the transplant turns out to be Dr. Johannes Aas. Journalists love him. Gene Weingarten from the Washington Post wrote a dialogue about him (which I adapted for my video below) and Aas was featured in blogs like "News of the Weird." Everybody else though -- besides his patients -- probably thinks he's nuts.

But the craziest thing of all, might just be that he's not nuts. For example, his published case reports on stool transplantation were featured in a prestigious speciality journal called Clinical Infectious Disease. This is a journal that's peer-reviewed, with a high impact factor, meaning that it goes through a rigorous editorial review process and gets read and cited by lots of specialists.

I looked up this paper and read it.  The langauge certainly seemed "scientific," capped off with a stern enough title: "Recurrent Clostridium difficile Colitis: Case series involving 18 patients treated with donor stool administered via a nasogastric tube." But the real litmus test, as far as I know, involve the letters to the editor. Getting published in a prestigious journal is great -- but bad studies do occasionally get published in great journals. When that happens, the letters to the editor can be swift and furious. Experts weigh in, critique this, critique that -- in these letters, you can find some most insightful viewpoints.

After perusing through the entire National Library of Medicine database, I found one published letter to the editor. It was in electronic form, so I had to click a few links to get to the page. Oh boy, moment of truth, I thought. This was it.

I felt a faint dread -- as I approached the link to the response on stool transplants, I readied myself for disappointment. Was this the letter that was going to expose the flaws of Aas? A cynical sneer of a report, tearing us apart the way Vioxx did to people's hearts last year?

One click.

Two clicks.

I held my breath. Suddenly, the paper title popped open:

                     " 'It lacked aesthetic appeal.'             

                                           So what?           

                                         It worked." 

Crohn’s was just another digestive tract problem until Dr. Burrill B. Crohn and his team pinpointed the condition and named it. Their research found that Crohn’s Disease affected the layers of the intestinal lining. They also discovered that if exacerbated, the disease could actually eat through the wall of the intestines themselves. This can lead to serious complications. However, if discovered early and treated most people will never reach this stage.

Crohn’s disease generally rears its ugly head in between the ages of 15 and 30. This doesn’t mean that the disease cannot manifest in those who fall either under or over this age range. The group with the highest prevalence rate of Crohn’s appear to be Jews of Northern European descent – or Ashkenazi Jews – but remember, Crohn’s disease affects people all over the world.

It is believed that Crohn’s disease has its roots in autoimmune functioning. This means that the body actually turns on itself and begins to attack tissue that is not threatening. This aggressive response by the body takes the digestive tract out of homeostasis and can cause a host of digestive problems.

Crohn’s Disease operates in a seemingly cyclical manner. This means that a person with Crohn’s isn’t always suffering. There are periods where the symptoms are active and other times of complete remission. Some people may not have a bout with Crohn’s for months or years. However, this being said, the symptoms can come out of left field and hit like a runaway train. So, it is important for those with Crohn’s to be vigilant and take proper care of their health.

It is also fairly difficult to diagnose Crohn’s Disease because each of the IBD’s share common symptoms. In order to procure a correct diagnosis a doctor must usually go through a variety of steps. Oftentimes, people with Crohn’s Disease are misdiagnosed at first with another gastrointestinal disorder.

Even with all the current research, scientists are not sure what in fact causes Crohn’s. There are a few different schools of thought on the subject. As previously discussed, the leading theory is that Crohn’s Disease is autoimmune in nature. However, it is also likely also passed on through genetic information. Another theory provided is that Crohn’s is caused by infections in the intestinal lining. The most likely theory is that the origin of Crohn’s disease is a shotgun of all these theories. Each brings a piece of the puzzle to the table and the disease works from there.

There are also many more resources and lots of information about controlling and treating Crohn’s Disease symptoms here Breakthrough Crohn's Disease Guide