Fecal Impaction query.

[Mooie]

My son has always suffered with his bowels. He's almost 8 and has never really had a solid bowel movement. I've taken him to the Dr's on numerous occasions, a couple of times over blood in his stool. I've always been brushed off with, "it'll be normal for him to have loose stools if its always been like that"

On Friday a GP told me to take him him A&E for suspected UTI (he told them he'd been in pain for 2 months) after an xray and a feel of his tummy he was diagnosed with impaction and put on movicol.

My question is, as he's always had bowel problems should I be asking the GP to follow up on this to see if there is an underlying problem. I feel this impaction may have been going on for sometime. Its not diet related (unless he has some allergies we don't know about) I'm just wondering if anyone knows the best way forward from here? Or do I just let the movicol treatment run its course and hope it doesn't happen again .

Thanks

[Yaleamanda]

For most children with constipation the underlying cause is not diagnosable. For a small number it is related to slow gut motility (the muscles in the bowel moving things through more slowly than they should) or something like a food intolerance or allergy or rarely, it can be related to another medical condition. Constipation is also more common in children with disabilities, but again it is not always possible to unpick the underlying cause. However, once a child has experienced a painful bowel action, or if they are soiling, they are likely to have a behavioural response to that e.g. withholding. However, any related behavioural or psychological issues tend to get better when the symptoms of the constipation are better.