Barium Enema

7 Responses to Barium Enema

1. ryanscottwright says:

   November 23, 2009 at 6:44 pm

   I had both a colonoscopy and barium enema xray 3 days apart from each other. About the procedures: The flushing for the colonoscopy was more intense than for the barium xray. The trilite solution taken for the colonoscopy was not only disgusting, but also harsh on the system. The prep for the barium enema was easier to take, but with no sedation for the procedure, it is extremely uncomfortable. These are just my opinions, your experience could be different.
2. jessicaBARBIEDOLL says:

   November 23, 2009 at 6:46 pm

   Very informative!
3. mr1muffin1man says:

   November 23, 2009 at 6:54 pm

   It was quite uncomfortable – I prefer the colonoscopy!
4. mr1muffin1man says:

   November 23, 2009 at 6:55 pm

   I had to have a barium enema immediatley folowing a colonoscopy, because the colonoscopy instrument could not go around the sharp corner on the far side to view my ascending colon. They took a lot of pictures, so I did a search on the extent of the radiation, and found it is 4 mSv, whereas 50 mSv is the lowest possible dose in which cancer has ever been found to occur. All was fine: I hope that next time, they will get the colonoscope all the way around while I am sedated!
5. WarDawg1986 says:

   November 23, 2009 at 7:04 pm

   One question, how is this better than colonoscopy? Barium is not safe and is considered to be immuno-suppressive. I did a presentation on colorectal cancer and first heard about this method, but had no idea about barium, But now, I do.  Colonoscopy removes polyps that form and prevent future growths of tumor/cancer.
6. bmedinago says:

   November 23, 2009 at 8:03 pm

   unlike colonoscopy, this is not an invasive procedure – whether or not if it’s better… that would depend on what your physician wanted to study. not all colonoscopy are used for polyps removal although it’s one of its purposes
7. redmilkcrate says:

   November 23, 2009 at 8:57 pm

   A lot of patients can not tolerate colonoscopy. Also it can cause damage to the bowel. The barium enema will not damage the bowel and is better tolerated.However there is a realtively new technique – the CT colonoscopy. With newer faster scanners, and the use of a 3D reconstruction platform to generate an accurate non invaisive image of the bowel. However this involves a high dose of radiation. So you have to think, which technique?? You have to play off one risk against another.