[Hemorrhagic rectocolitis].

Pulmonary complications are rarely reported in association with ulcerative colitis. Our patient had ulcerative colitis, diagnosed three decades earlier. Following a relapse of his ulcerative colitis, the patient developed bloodstained sputum. Chest CT-scan showed signs of pulmonary tissue infiltration indicating pulmonary vasculitis. No causative agent for this clinical condition was found. Testing for ANCA showed the vasculitis to most likely be secondary to his ulcerative colitis. The lung lesions responded to corticosteroid therapy within a week, and the following chest CT-scan was normal.

Colitis, Ulcerative↗

PubMed1998

[Leukocyte scintigraphy, endoscopy, airway x-ray. New methods for the diagnosis of colitis and Crohn disease].

In inflammatory bowel disease, the use of various diagnostic techniques to visualise the extent and severity of inflammation is of vital importance at the onset of disease, in the event of subsequent relapse, and when complications are suspected. Medical treatment and surgery can thus be optimised and limited operations performed, especially in Crohn's disease. The article consists in a summary of published reports from a single centre, representing 10 years' experience of three new techniques for assessing inflammatory bowel disease. Leucocyte scintigraphy is a non-invasive and well-tolerated method whereby the small and large bowels are assessed on the same occasion, and complications such as abscesses and possibly fistulas can be visualised. Intraoperative enteroscopy yields more accurate information than previous methods for deciding the extent of small bowel resections, and often permitting gut to be saved. Air enema radiography is a convenient and safe means of obtaining reliable information about the presence and depth of ulceration in ulcerative colitis. These methods facilitate the care of patients with inflammatory bowel disease, and should be made available at centres where such patients are treated.

Colitis, Ulcerative↗