Young Crohn's
Blog Series

IBD Basics: Corticosteriods

What are Corticosteroids & Why are they important? Corticosteriods are a group of anti inflammatory medications – including cortisone, hydrocortisone and prednisone – which mimic the hormones produced by the adrenal gland, which lies above the kidneys. The hormones created by the adrenal gland have many functions but one in particular is that is the ability to heal inflammation; particularly in the bowel. When prescribed in doses that exceed your body’s usual levels, corticosteroids suppress inflammation; helping the symptoms and side effects of inflammatory conditions such as arthritis and asthma. Why are they used to treat IBD? They are a first line…

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Nutrition

Deficiencies with IBD

What deficiencies are common with IBD?  When you have a digestive disorder, your gut does not function as it should; which means it has trouble absorbing all the necessary nutrients from the food you take in. For many people with IBD; they can become, overtime, deficient in particular vitamins and minerals. Most commonly are: Vitamin A: Also known as Retinol; it helps your vision in dim light, your immune system fight against infections as well keeping your skin and linings of some part of the body healthy. Vitamin B’s: Included under this umbrella is Thiamin (vitamin B1), Riboflavin (vitamin B2),…

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Hospital

Life Lately | “And Another Thing..”

Do you ever have those moments when you just think ‘What else can be thrown at me?’ Not that I haven’t been feeling okay lately, but its been chock full of just things that need to be sorted and nothing is every simple with me. For one reason or another, every week for a while, I’ve had my blood taken. Sometimes for my IBD monitoring or a potential flare up, my liver levels checking and then for clinics. It’s been pin cushion central, and I can handle that but it’s not normal is it? The reasons for the blood test…

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Awareness

IBD ADVOCACY TAG

So, I was recently tagged by the lovely Thalia Skye in her vlog for the IBD Advocacy Tag. This has been a tag created by Megan over at Front Butter Youtuber – which you can watch here – helping to promote and raise the profile of IBD advocacy online. The premise is to answer the below five questions and tag five more fellow IBD-ers to continue this thread. Here we go! What form of IBD do you have? I have Crohn’s disease. I was diagnosed with Crohn’s Colitis back in 2011 as my IBD was just located in my descending…

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Blog Series

The What and Why: Vitamin D

What is Vitamin D? Vitamin D is a nutrient needed to help control our absorption of calcium and phosphate entering our body from our diet. These particular minerals are important for healthy bones, teeth and muscles. Vitamin D is created from direct sunlight on our skin when we are outdoors. It is abundant in the months from April to October and found in some foods; such as oily fish, eggs, margarine, some red meat, mushrooms and fortified cereals. How do you know if you’re deficient? Most people in the UK are Vitamin D deficient due to the lack of sunlight,…

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