SYNOPSIS:Most people take pooing for granted. You eat and then you poo out the waste. But if this simple process does not work at the right pace, stool builds up in the colon and rectum leading to many difficulties. In Victoria, over 1000 children are hospitalised with constipation each year. Nearly all of these are in public hospitals and hospital costs related to just constipation are $1 million per year. 10% of these children have multiple admissions indicating a chronic condition. At the RCH, over 500 outpatient visits per year are for constipation. Referrals for constipation are seen at 6 different clinics within RCH, and many are seen in the Emergency Department. Most respond to simple oral laxatives but there is a role in resistant cases also for physiotherapy using electrical stimulation.

SPEAKERS:Professor Tony Catto-Smith is Director of the Department of Gastroenterology and Clinical Nutrition at the Royal Children’s Hospital, Melbourne. He has a clinical and research interest in disorders of colorectal function, including motility disorders, the use of percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy placement, and the pathogenesis and treatment of Crohn’s and Ulcerative Colitis.

Dr Bridget Southwell is head of the Surgical Research Group, MCRI and is an Honorary Senior Fellow with The University of Melbourne. She has a PhD in Biochemistry and specialist training in the enteric nervous system, the nerves within the intestine and in developmental biology. She was awarded a Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Gastroenterology Society of Australia and set up her own research Group on Gut Motility at MCRI in 2000. She was awarded an NHMRC Senior Research Fellowship in 2007 and has had 4 NHMRC Project grants on nerves in human intestine and constipation.