Removal of large colon

[stepmom74]

My stepson went through surgery today. He had been diagnosed with an infection in his bowel of clostriduum difficile.
After treatment for a period of 7 days, he was no worse nor any better. other problems required ventilation to keep him breathing and refribrilation to regulate his heart once.

It appears that they had to remove his large colon entirely.  What is the opinion here about quality of life here after and is it possible that perhaps a colostomy bag might not be an indefinite situation.  Thank you

[TrudieC]

It depends on whether he has Crohn's or not.  If his problem was not Crohn's they may be able to either connect his small bowel to his rectum or, if his rectum is diseased, create a new rectum out of his small bowel and sew it into his rectal muscles (J-Pouch surgery).  With Crohn's they won't do the J-Pouch as the disease may reoccur in the small bowel and you can't afford to lose any of it to the J-Pouch surgery.

[Morecambe]

Hi - I underwent a total colectomy nearly five years ago - but for torrential diverticular bleeding.  Another name for the procedure was an ileorectal anastomosis whereby the farthest end of the ileum is connected to the top of the rectum.  I did not require any pouches/stoma attachments etc.

In response to another Medhelp patient I described my experience on Medhelp - please log on to:-

http://www.medhelp.org/posts/show/523166

Hope this helps.  

Good luck
Morecambe