Maintaining Your Health

Can Antispasmodics Help You Manage Your IBS Symptoms?

While medications can't cure IBS, they can alleviate some of its symptoms. For example, in some cases, antispasmodic drugs make life easier and more comfortable for IBS sufferers. How might these drugs help you manage your condition?

Reduce IBS Pain

Some people with IBS have persistent and regular problems with abdominal pain and cramping. These problems can be caused by spasms in your digestive tract and other parts of your stomach. They can be painful and uncomfortable to live with.

In some cases, antispasmodics are beneficial here. Some of these medications home in on the muscles in your digestive tract. They relax them by targeting the cell signals in your stomach that make these muscles contract.

If these muscles relax and stop contracting as much, then you should reduce or even eradicate spasms, cramps and pain in this area. Your day-to-day life should become more comfortable and you'll find it easier to control your IBS.

Control Loose Bowel Movements

While some people with IBS suffer from constipation, many have the opposite problem. They have regular bouts of diarrhoea. They often have to rush to the toilet at short notice many times a day when they have an IBS flare-up.

Antispasmodics can help here too. They can block neurotransmitters in your nervous system that can affect involuntary functions such as the need to go to the toilet. They can also make your body take more time to process food through your digestive system and into your bowels.

Plus, they can also reduce the amount of mucus your bowels create. This mucus can affect the consistency of stools and make them more liquid. At the same time, these medications can bulk up your stools to make them firmer and less runny.

So, you might not need to have a bowel movement as often or as urgently if you take antispasmodics. Your need to go to the toilet should reduce. Plus, when you do have a bowel movement, your stools should be firmer and closer to normal than they were.

If you can reduce the number of times you need the toilet and improve the consistency of your stools, then you will feel better. Your body also has more time to process food.

To find out more about antispasmodics and their use as an IBS treatment, talk to your IBS clinic or GP. They can talk you through available options and assess if this solution might be suitable for you. If it is, then they can prescribe an appropriate drug.