Hemorrhoid Medication: When Why And Which Ones To Use
A number of OTC creams, ointments, and pads that contain hydrocortisone or witch hazel are available to help relieve pain, swelling, and itching caused by hemorrhoids. According to the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, doctors recommend using over-the-counter products for a week. If symptoms persist beyond a week, follow up with your doctor.
Creams and suppositories containing hydrocortisone can cause the skin to weaken and thin, so they should not be used for more than a week. If any of these creams cause a rash or dry skin around the area, contact your healthcare provider.
A fiber supplement, such as Metamucil , or a stool softener, such as Citrucel , can help prevent constipation.
Avoid laxatives, which can lead to diarrhea and worsen hemorrhoid symptoms.
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How Are Internal Hemorrhoids Treated
In terms of treating internal hemorrhoids, most of the time it is believed that this condition ends by itself. Because most of the time, internal hemorrhoids dont show any major symptoms and can reduce the hemorrhoids automatically. But there are some known ways how to get rid of internal hemorrhoids in case the disease shows more than one symptom.
They range from non-operative medical interventions to office-based surgery procedures. However, that will depend on factors such as age and severity of the condition. Since the low severity of internal hemorrhoids can be helped by some lifestyle changes and aggressive treatment isnt necessary.
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A Range Of Treatments
In choosing the treatment for hemorrhoids, one should consider the disease grade and severity, its impact on the quality of life, the degree of pain it causes, the patientâs likelihood of adhering to treatment, and the patientâs personal preference.
Regardless of severity, treatment almost always starts with a high-fiber diet and other lifestyle modifications that include bowel movement behaviors. This requires practitioners to spend significant time on patient education regardless of the type or the severity of the disease.
Treatments can be grouped in 3 categories: conservative, office-based, and surgical. Practitioners should thoroughly discuss the options with the patient, emphasizing the pros and cons of each.
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When Do I Need To See A Health Care Provider For Hemorrhoids
You should see your health care provider if you:
- Still have symptoms after 1 week of at-home treatment
- Have bleeding from your rectum. Hemorrhoids are a common cause of bleeding, but other conditions can also cause bleeding. They include Crohn’s disease, ulcerative colitis, colorectal cancer, and . So it’s important to see your provider to find the cause of the bleeding.
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What Are The Symptoms Of Hemorrhoids
Internal hemorrhoids rarely cause pain unless they prolapse. Many people with internal hemorrhoids dont know they have them because they dont have symptoms.
If you have symptoms of internal hemorrhoids, you might see blood on toilet paper, in stool or the toilet bowl. These are signs of rectal bleeding.
Signs of external hemorrhoids include:
- Rectal bleeding.
What Are The Treatments For Hemorrhoids
If at-home treatments for hemorrhoids don’t help you, you may need a medical procedure. There are several different procedures that your provider can do in the office. These procedures use different techniques to cause scar tissue to form in the hemorrhoids. This cuts off the blood supply, which usually shrinks the hemorrhoids. In severe cases, you may need surgery.
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If You Notice Bleeding Before During Or After Bowel Movements
If you notice blood before, during, or after bowel movements, you should seek medical care. Bleeding during bowel movements may be associated with hemorrhoids, but it could also be . Call your doctor so you can get an accurate diagnosis and rule out anything life-threatening. Your doctor can help you identify and address the cause of your bleeding. And if its hemorrhoids, they can offer treatment, relief, and suggestions to help you prevent hemorrhoids from recurring.
How To Treat Hemorrhoids And When You Should See Your Doctor
Pregnancy also can weaken these tissues, which is why pregnant women often experience hemorrhoids. Other potential causes include chronic constipation or diarrhea, straining during bowel movements and sitting on the toilet for extended periods. Also, frequently lifting heavy objects may increase the likelihood of hemorrhoids.
What are the symptoms of hemorrhoids?
Hemorrhoid symptoms vary depending on whether the inflamed veins are external or internal.
While hemorrhoids are not dangerous, they can develop complications. An external hemorrhoid may become infected or develop blood clots. Internal hemorrhoid bleeding may lead to anemia, or a low red blood cell count.
How are hemorrhoids treated at home?
In many cases, hemorrhoids will go away on their own within a few days, including prolapsed hemorrhoids. You can help reduce the irritation by eating more high-fiber foods, such as whole grains and green, leafy vegetables and drinking plenty of fluids .
Try to avoid straining during a bowel movement, as this can make hemorrhoids worse. A fiber supplement or gentle stool softener may help.
If you have pain, try taking a warm bath or a sitz bath, which is a shallow plastic tub that allows you to sit in just a few inches of water. Sitz baths are available over the counter adding Epsom salt may help to soothe the irritation. Be sure to dry the area thoroughly after a bath.
When to see the doctor
If at-home remedies do not provide relief, it may be time to see a doctor.
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How To Prevent Hemorrhoids
First, make your bathroom time into an express experience, says Mitchell Bernstein, M.D., Director in the Division of Colon & Rectal Surgery at NYU Langone Health. In fact, you shouldn’t spend longer than 15 minutes on the toilet.
The longer you linger, the more pressure youll be exerting in your intra-abdominal region, he says. That can cause blood to pool in the veins in and around your rectum, leading to hemorrhoids.
Also, increase your water and fiber intake. Shoot for at least 25 grams of fiber per day from sources such as oatmeal, prunes, fruits, vegetables, and beans, says Dr. Sheth.
Youve heard that directive before, and heres just one more reason to focus on it. With that combo, your stools will become more pliable, shortening the time of transit through your digestive system, and also making it easier to poop.
That reduces or even eliminates the need for any straining or pushing when youre on the toiletan action that causes significant pressure on the veins and can lead to inflammation.
When your time to poop arrivesalways a joyous eventdont put it off. The longer you delay, the more water will be reabsorbed into the colon, making your stool harder to pass. That increases your chances of constipation and hemorrhoids.
How to Tell If Your Poop is Normal:
How To Diagnose Internal Hemorrhoids
If you have any above-mentioned history, signs, and symptoms, consult your doctor for an early diagnosis, your doctor may do a Per Rectal examination or digital rectal examination to confirm the diagnosis of hemorrhoids. Apart from DRE, proctoscopy can help in diagnosis.
In order to rule out other diseases, you might need other tests such as sigmoidoscopy & colonoscopy.
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Dietary Changes And Self Care
If constipation is thought to be the cause of your haemorrhoids, you need to keep your stools soft and regular, so that you donât strain when passing stools.
You can do this by increasing the amount of fibre in your diet. Good sources of fibre include wholegrain bread, cereal, fruit and vegetables.
You should also drink plenty of water and avoid caffeine .
When going to the toilet, you should:
- avoid straining to pass stools, because it may make your haemorrhoids worse
- use moist toilet paper, rather than dry toilet paper, or baby wipes to clean your bottom after passing a stool
- pat the area around your bottom, rather than rubbing it
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How Can I Treat Hemorrhoids At Home
Hemorrhoids often go away on their own without treatment. Symptoms like pain and bleeding may last one week or slightly longer. In the meantime, you can take these steps to ease symptoms:
- Apply over-the-counter medications containing lidocaine, witch hazel or hydrocortisone to the affected area.
- Drink more water.
- Increase fiber intake through diet and supplements. Try to obtain at least 20-35 grams of daily fiber intake
- Soak in a warm bath for 10 to 20 minutes a day.
- Soften stool by taking laxatives.
- Take nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs for pain and inflammation.
- Use toilet paper with lotion or flushable wet wipes to gently pat and clean your bottom after pooping. You can also use a tissue or washcloth moistened with water.
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Natural Remedies For Hemorrhoids
- By Matthew Solan, Executive Editor, Harvard Men’s Health Watch
Hemorrhoids are painful, unpleasant, and, um, well, difficult to talk about. But they actually are quite common: about half of people over age 50 have had them. However, theyre easy to treat and manage.
Hemorrhoids can be troublesome and embarrassing, but they often shrink on their own with simple self-help care and over-the-counter remedies, says Dr. Howard LeWine, assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School.
Things You Can Add To Your Sitz Bath
You can just use warm water in your sitz bath/bathtub, or you can also add Epsom salt, baking soda, sea salt, essential oils such as lavender oil or herbs of choice.
Common herbs like red raspberry leaf, witch hazel, chamomile, yarrow or calendula are great choices.
You can also try the Chinese herb She Chuang Zi used to ease haemorrhoid symptoms in China for ages if this is something accessible to you.
Preparing herbal sitz baths is like brewing a huge pot of tea. Brew your tea, add it to the tub, sit and relax.
Note: Women should avoid this treatment during their periods.
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How Can I Treat My Hemorrhoids
You can most often treat your hemorrhoids at home by
- taking a stool softener or a fiber supplement such as psyllium or methylcellulose
- drinking water or other nonalcoholic liquids each day as recommended by your health care professional
- not straining during bowel movements
- not sitting on the toilet for long periods of time
- taking over-the-counter pain relievers such as acetaminophen, ibuprofen, naproxen, or aspirin
- sitting in a tub of warm water, called a sitz bath, several times a day to help relieve pain
Applying over-the-counter hemorrhoid creams or ointments or using suppositoriesa medicine you insert into your rectummay relieve mild pain, swelling, and itching of external hemorrhoids. Most often, doctors recommend using over-the-counter products for 1 week. You should follow up with your doctor if the products
- do not relieve your symptoms after 1 week
Most prolapsed internal hemorrhoids go away without at-home treatment. However, severely prolapsed or bleeding internal hemorrhoids may need medical treatment.
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When Hemorrhoid Surgery May Be Necessary
Very few people fewer than 10 percent of all adults who see a doctor because of symptomatic hemorrhoids will require a surgical operation.
Surgery to remove hemorrhoids is called a hemorrhoidectomy.
Your doctor may recommend a hemorrhoidectomy if:
- You have large external hemorrhoids
- You have both internal and external hemorrhoids
- An internal hemorrhoid has prolapsed
- You have excessive bleeding
In a hemorrhoidectomy, the doctor makes a small incision to remove the hemorrhoid and surrounding tissue before closing the wound with stitches.
A hemorrhoidectomy is performed in an operating room and can be done under general anesthesia, in which you are unconscious and unable to feel pain.
Hemorrhoidectomy is associated with postoperative pain, but the procedure is successful for 95 percent of cases.
More recently, another option aimed at avoiding the postoperative pain of a hemorrhoidectomy has become available, called a stapled hemorrhoidopexy. A circular stapling device pulls the hemorrhoidal tissue upward and to its normal position, stapling it in place. The staples eventually fall out over time.
According to a study published in the journal Techniques in Coloproctology, in the long term, patient satisfaction, resolution of symptoms, quality of life, and functional outcome appeared similar among patients after stapled hemorrhoidopexy and hemorrhoidectomy. But other sources note that stapling has been associated with a greater risk of recurrence and rectal prolapse.
What Are The Treatment Options
Small hemorrhoids often clear up without treatment or with home treatment and lifestyle changes. If youve continued problems or complications, such as bleeding, you should see your doctor.
Your doctor can rule out other causes of bleeding during bowel movements, such as colon or . If your symptoms become severe, your doctor may recommend medical procedures to remove or shrink the hemorrhoids.
Your doctor may recommend a minimally invasive outpatient treatment. Outpatient treatments are treatments that your doctor performs in their office. Some treatments include the following:
- Rubber band ligation is the most common nonsurgical treatment, and it involves your doctor tying a tight band around the base of the hemorrhoid to cut off the blood supply. Eighty percent of people who receive treatment for hemorrhoids have this type of treatment.
- During coagulation, your doctor uses infrared light, heat, or extreme cold to shrink the hemorrhoid.
- During sclerotherapy, your doctor injects a chemical to shrink the hemorrhoid.
If you have severe hemorrhoids or hemorrhoids that dont respond to in-office medical treatments, you may need a doctor to surgically extract them. This has been shown to provide symptom relief and reduce future outbreaks.
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Best Treatments For Internal Hemorrhoids
There are various modes of management for internal hemorrhoids starting from home remedies to surgical methods
- home remedies which include lifestyle modifications such as a high fiber diet, drinking more water, warm sitz bath
- nonsurgical management such as over the counter creams, analgesics, laxatives, and stool softeners
- Minimally invasive procedures such as
- Lords dilatation
- Injection sclerosant therapy
- Barron’s banding
Newer methods such as harmonic scalpel therapy
- HAL – RAR Doppler-guided haemorrhoidal artery ligation & rectoanal repair proctoplasty
Constipation: The Main Culprit Of Hemorrhoids
Every doctor will tell you that if you find yourself straining on the toilet, struggling to go, and in general, experiencing constipation, your hemorrhoids are bound to become inflamed.
This can lead to extreme hemorrhoid pain.
A regular, happy, and healthy colon is the key to preventing flare-ups, among many other potential diseases and lower intestinal conditions.
In the end, the goal is to have softer stools so your body doesnt overexert itself during bowel movements.
Your hemorrhoids will then proceed with their regular functions and avoid becoming inflamed and irritated.
This is a great post that describes how to stop hemorrhoid itching and burning.
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Factors That Can Cause Constipation And Hemorrhoids In Men:
- Not drinking enough water
- Eating foods high in fat content
- Eating too many dairy products
- Certain medications
- Resisting the urge to go
- Lack of exercise
- Using laxatives too often
If you are in your fifties or older and can relate to the problem of constipation, your risk of a hemorrhoid flare-up is much higher.
The best solution is to eliminate the list of potential factors that cause constipation.
Remember, if you need to drastically change your daily dieting habits from junk food to healthy meals, do so in small increments.
This also includes any other lifestyle change, like your exercise regime. A drastic change can lead to further constipation, and you wont want that for your hemorrhoids.