Acute phase reactants in irritable bowel syndrome

Mehmet Rami Helvaci (1)
Engin Altintas (1)
Atilla Yalcin (1)
Orhan Ekrem Muftuoglu (1)
Abdulrazak Abyad (2)
Lesley Pocock (3)

(1) Specialist of Internal Medicine, M.D.
(2) Middle-East Academy for Medicine of Aging, M.D.
(3) Medi-WORLD International

Corresponding Author:
Mehmet Rami Helvaci, M.D.
07400, ALANYA, Turkey
Phone: 00-90-506-4708759
Email: mramihelvaci@hotmail.com

Received: March 2022; Accepted: April 2022; Published: May, 2022
Citation: Mehmet Rami Helvaci et al. Obesity may actually be a precirrhotic condition in adults. Middle East Journal of Nursing 2022; 16(1): 20-26 DOI: 10.5742/MEJN2021.9378017

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ABSTRACT

Background: Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is one of the frequent causes of recurrent upper abdominal discomfort in adults.

Method: Consecutive patients with the IBS and age and sex-matched control cases were studied. IBS was diagnosed according to Rome II criteria in the absence of red flag symptoms including pain, diarrhea interfering with sleep, weight loss, fever, and any pathological finding in physical examination.

Results: The study included 473 patients with the IBS (308 females and 165 males) and 271 control cases. Mean age of the patients was 43.0 years. Interestingly, 65.1% of the patients with IBS were female. Prevalence of smoking was higher in the patients with IBS, significantly (38.4% versus 18.8%, p<0.001). Although the mean height, weight, body mass index, hematocrit value, and systolic and diastolic blood pressures were similar in both groups, erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) (14.6 versus 12.3 mm/h, p=0.02 ) and C-reactive protein (CRP) (2.9 versus 2.0 mg/L, p<0.001) values were higher in the IBS group, significantly.

Conclusion: Probably IBS is a low-grade inflammatory process initiated by smoking, infections, inflammations, anxiety, depression, sleep disorders, illness fear, and cancer fear-like stresses, and eventually terminates with dysfunctions of the gastrointestinal and genitourinary tracts and elevations of ESR and CRP-like acute phase reactants (APR) in the plasma. The elevated APR will probably terminate with an accelerated atherosclerotic process all over the body and a shorthened survival in both genders.

Key words: Irritable bowel syndrome, erythrocyte sedimentation rate, C-reactive protein, chronic endothelial damage, atherosclerosis, smoking, metabolic syndrome