Do you easily develop constipation, diarrhea, or indigestion? If yes, your gut motility changes can be the reason. Gut motility plays a significant role in gastrointestinal motility, which is a process that moves food, liquids, and waste through the gut after taking nutrients from them. Many lifestyle habits and conditions can affect gut motility. Learn the science behind gut motility and how diseases affect gut motility in this article. You can contact us by visiting our clinic or visiting our website at https://doralhw.org/.
Science of gut motility
Our food needs to go through the gut to be digested and absorbed by the small intestine and colon and for the removal of waste from the body. All these movements are caused by muscles that are found in the gut wall and controlled by the enteric nervous system (ENS). This system regulates secretion and sensation within the gut. This process of moving food, liquids, and waste through the gut is called gastrointestinal motility.
Gut motility is the function of stretching and contraction of the muscles in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract and when the contraction of these muscles works in sync it’s called peristalsis. Peristalsis creates a progressive wave of contraction and relaxation of the muscular gut tube, to force the food to go through the system. These movements allow food to progress along with the digestive tract along with the nutrient absorption process.
A wide range of diseases and disorders can affect your gut motility which occur due to damage to nerves, muscles, or both of these ENS components. Most often motility problems occur due to drug side effects, for example, diarrhea can occur due to the antibiotic erythromycin which stimulates gut motility, or constipation from narcotics that suppress gut motility. Many motility disorders may not have a defined cause but are quite common like IBS. Some are less common but life-threatening, like gastroparesis or intestinal pseudo-obstruction.
Disorders
While many gastric motility disorders affect your gut health, here are the most common ones along with their symptoms:
- Gastroparesis: This condition causes symptoms like nausea, burping, bloating, heartburn, indigestion, regurgitation, or vomiting.
- Achalasia: It causes symptoms like chest pain, regurgitation, heartburn, and difficulty swallowing.
- Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD): It causes symptoms like acid reflux and heartburn more than twice a week.
- Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS): It causes symptoms such as constipation, stomach pain, rectal pain, cramping, nausea, bloating, and gas.
- Dumping syndrome: It causes symptoms such as bloating, abdominal pain, stomach rumbling, nausea, and diarrhea.
Gut motility plays a significant role in the process of moving food from the stomach to the small intestine, absorbing nutrients along the way, and removing waste from the body. However, the gut can be affected by different lifestyle factors and conditions which need to be managed properly to ensure gut motility works efficiently without any problem.
If you need help with gut problems, visit our gastroenterology clinic in Brooklyn to get professional medical help. Call us to book your appointment today!!!
You can schedule an appointment with Doral Health and Wellness Gastroenterology Center’s best gastro doctors in Brooklyn. If you are looking for treatments, you can also talk to our specialists and inquire with them. To schedule an appointment, please visit us at 1797 Pitkin Avenue, Brooklyn, New York 11212 or call 1-347-384-5690.