What are the symptoms and treatments of intestinal spasms?

Intestinal spasm is actually a common disease in children. Generally speaking, parents should understand the symptoms and treatment methods of intestinal spasm one by one in order to take corresponding preventive measures in advance.

Intestinal spasm symptoms:

(1) Children who are usually healthy: If they suddenly develop paroxysmal, intermittent abdominal pain and no abnormal physical signs are found during the intermittent period, this is the main feature of this disease. The abdominal pain of the child may last for several minutes or tens of minutes, and may come and go. After repeated attacks of tens of minutes or hours, the abdominal pain may no longer occur.

(2) Individual children: Recurrent abdominal pain may last for several days, and the severity of the pain varies. In severe cases, the child may roll over on the spot. In typical cases, the pain is mainly in the umbilicus, that is, the spasm occurs in the small intestine. When the proximal large intestine spasms, the pain is in the right lower abdomen; when the distal large intestine spasms, the pain occurs in the left lower abdomen; if the child has abdominal pain before defecation, it may be a spasm of the descending colon or sigmoid colon.

(3) A small number of older children may experience colic in the ribs, mostly on one side, due to spasms in the hepatic or splenic flexures of the colon. Younger children may also experience colic in the subcostal region of the abdomen, due to spasms in the stomach. Strictly speaking, this is not intestinal spasm, but stomach spasm. However, because the mechanisms of occurrence are similar, massage therapy is also effective for intestinal spasm.

Treatment of intestinal spasms:

Treatment can be determined based on the scoring results of intestinal spasm. The scoring refers to the intensity and duration of crying, the accompanying symptoms of crying, and the parents' views on their children's crying. If crying is related to intestinal spasm, but the crying is not severe, the first and second level treatment plans are used; if it is a severe intestinal spasm, the third level treatment is used.

1. First-level treatment: Comfort the child, rock the child, reduce environmental noise, cover the baby's abdomen with a hot water bag; support and care for parents; take Chinese medicine or dimethicone. Some Chinese medicines have anti-spasmodic effects. After taking Chinese medicine (powder composed of chamomile, verbena, licorice, fennel, vanilla and mint) for 7 days, intestinal spasms improved, but the number of night awakenings did not decrease. Dimethicone is a non-absorbable drug that changes the surface tension of bubbles, causing bubbles to fuse or disperse, and promotes gas discharge. It has no side effects on the human body. Try to use it to reduce intestinal gas. But the research results on it are inconsistent. In a cross-control study using dimethicone and a placebo, 1/4-2/3 of the children showed improvement in symptoms, but there was no significant difference compared with the placebo. Other drugs that reduce intestinal gas, such as activated carbon and α-galactosidase, can absorb gas or help digest high-fiber foods and reduce fermentation gas production, but their effectiveness in treating intestinal spasms is still uncertain.

Second, the second level of treatment is drug treatment. Anticonvulsants (such as cimetropium bromide) can block the muscarinic receptors of smooth muscle, and can also act directly on smooth muscle to relieve smooth muscle spasms. If it is ineffective, dicyclomine hydrochloride can be used. As an anticholine drug, it has an atropine-like anticonvulsant effect and a certain central sedative effect. It has a certain effect in treating infantile intestinal spasms. However, recent studies have found that infants under 6 months old may experience respiratory arrest when using this drug, which limits the application of this drug. So far, there is no completely effective drug to treat intestinal spasms.

3. Tertiary treatment involves dietary changes and/or drug therapy. Breastfeeding mothers should not consume milk, dairy products, fish, and eggs; artificially fed infants are given soy milk or hydrolyzed casein formula, which can significantly improve infant intestinal spasms. For patients with intestinal spasms caused by CMPI, after removing milk protein and using soy milk or hydrolyzed protein instead, 71%-88% of children have improved symptoms. Since drug therapy (such as dicyclomine hydrochloride) has certain side effects and sometimes the therapeutic effect is not ideal, dietary changes may be more appropriate than medication.