Fecal Incontinence - Symptoms

Symptoms

Symptoms of FI can be primary or secondary. Primary symptoms include a lack of control for different bowel contents, e.g. solid stool, liquid/semi-formed stool, gas, which tends to worsen over time. Since bowel contents have a physiological odor, uncontrolled odor may be the main concern of the patient, causing much social anxiety. Secondary symptoms, the result of leaking stool, include pruritus ani, perianal skin irritation, urinary tract infections. Due to embarrassment, patients may only complain of a secondary symptom rather than acknowledge any degree of FI. If there is an underlying cause of FI, this may give other symptoms which are superimposed on the symptoms above.

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