What are the advantages and disadvantages of enema for children?

Nowadays, many people have serious difficulty in defecation. There are many reasons behind this, such as long-term bad eating habits, decreased gastrointestinal digestive function, etc. The inability to defecate normally for a long time is very harmful to health. In order to solve this problem, people will choose enema, which can help expel feces in the intestines. So what are the advantages and disadvantages of enema for children?

Advantages and disadvantages of enema for children:

Benefits of enema for children:

Short-term intermittent enema treatment has little impact on the whole body and few adverse reactions. It is a better laxative method and can be used for acute constipation (such as acute fecal impaction).

This method can sometimes be used to stimulate the rectum in order to re-establish the rectal defecation reflex, and can be used for early treatment of some constipation patients.

Enema therapy is also a basic treatment for childhood constipation and is often used to relieve constipation in children with idiopathic constipation or congenital megacolon.

For patients with severe constipation who have not responded to treatment with diet therapy, oral laxatives, etc., enema is often the last resort for defecation.

Disadvantages of enema for children:

1. Bone marrow damage

On March 9, 2004, a village doctor gave an enema to a 3-year-old child with a cough, who then developed stools resembling meat-washing soup. The child died after unsuccessful rescue efforts at a higher-level hospital. The reason was that the village doctor used excessive doses of drugs and used them in an irregular manner.

On June 1, 2004, a 2-year-old child in Henan was admitted to the hospital with acute myeloid leukemia. Examination revealed that the child had been suffering from repeated use of enema therapy to treat fever and colds in the past year. The hormones commonly used in enema therapy, such as dexamethasone and the antipyretic drug aminopyrine, were overdosed, generally 3 to 5 times! These drugs can cause bone marrow damage!

Rectal instillation uses a large amount of medication and the use of medication is not strict. Up to now, the country has not promoted it, and there is no strict standard to implement it. Everyone is using drugs indiscriminately, either orally or intravenously, as long as it is a drug, it is injected into the body. Most so-called empirical prescriptions contain dosages that are many times greater than those for oral or intravenous medications.

2. Low absorption

Because the rectal mucosa has fewer wrinkles, no villi, small liquid capacity, and small absorption area, drug absorption is relatively slow and the amount of drug entering the blood circulation is very limited.

3. Infectious diarrhea

Rectal instillation is not a safe and sterile method of drug administration. The intestines contain many bacteria, which may enter the deep intestines with the instillation solution and cause contamination. In particular, some antibiotics may kill the beneficial bacteria in the intestines, causing imbalance in the body's flora, leading to secondary infections and diarrhea, etc.

4. Damage to the intestines

The rectum has its own inherent physiological environment. Long-term or repeated rectal instillation of medication will cause changes in the physiological functions and environment of the rectal mucosa, rectal acidity and alkalinity, secretion and absorption of the rectal wall, and damage the intestines.

5. Colitis

Long-term use of soapy water enema can cause colitis, which is related to the alkaline effect of soap and the toxicity of long-chain fatty acids.

6. Complications

Complications associated with enema also include allergies, diarrhea, and dehydration, and there have been rare reports of death.