The small bowel is fairly difficult to investigate using traditional methods. You might need to have a capsule endoscopy if an endoscopic examination of your colon or stomach has failed to determine the cause of your symptoms, which may include obscure gastrointestinal bleeding and abdominal pain.
Pain, diarrhoea or constipation can be symptoms of underlying intestinal problems. Diseases such as Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis can cause inflammation, or even ulceration, in your bowel.
If you've been diagnosed with iron deficiency anaemia (low red blood cell count), you may have a capsule endoscopy to help identify the cause. One common cause of anaemia is bleeding within the gut, which may be from the stomach, large bowel or small bowel. The bleeding may not always be obvious or visible, so tests like a capsule endoscopy may be helpful.
A capsule endoscopy could help to diagnose these conditions and to rule out more serious diseases, especially if you have visible bleeding from your back passage, which should never be ignored. The Pillcam can also be used to examine possible abnormalities of the intestine that show up on abdominal scans. It is used to monitor patients with refractory coeliac disease and intestinal polyps.
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