What are the symptoms of rectal bleeding?

Rectal bleeding will manifest itself in symptoms such as fresh blood in the stool, black stool, and occult blood in the stool. Especially for middle-aged and elderly people, you must pay attention to it when you first start to have blood in the stool, because the older you are, the greater the risk of cancer. You should develop a good habit of regular bowel movements, exercise more, and eat less spicy food.

1. Fresh blood in stool: Generally comes from the lower end of the ileum, colon, rectum, and anus. The stool is bright red or dark red and may be mixed with mucus, pus and blood. Common diseases are: hemorrhoids and anal fissure bleeding. The blood in the stool caused by hemorrhoids may flow out in jets during defecation or drip after defecation; the amount of blood in the stool caused by anal fissure is small, but the anal pain is more severe. Rectal polyps bleed, the amount of blood in the stool is not large, the blood is attached to the surface of the stool, and sometimes the stool becomes thinner and strip-shaped or has pressure marks. Dysentery causes bloody stools with pus and blood, frequent bowel movements, and pain in the left lower abdomen.

2. Tarry stool: that is, black stool. If upper gastrointestinal bleeding is not vomited out, the blood will stay in the intestines for a long time. The hemoglobin in the blood will combine with the sulfide in the intestines to form ferrous sulfide. Ferrous sulfide makes the stool black and shiny, like tar. The presence of tarry stools indicates that the amount of bleeding has reached more than 60 ml. But be aware that certain foods and medicines can cause stools to turn black, which can be identified using a fecal occult blood test.

3. Occult blood in stool: Any small amount of gastrointestinal bleeding that does not cause a change in stool color and only tests positive for occult blood in the stool is called occult blood in stool. All diseases that cause gastrointestinal bleeding can cause occult blood in the stool, the most common of which are gastric ulcers and gastric cancer.