quote:What are the symptoms of your pouchitis?
Increased urgency, increased frequency, nightime leakage and spotting, increasing wateriness of schools. No bleeding.
Regarding 5-ASA: It is called Rowasa, Canasa, and Mesalazine in the USA, and Pentasa in capsule form.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mesalazine
It is used locally in enemas and suppositories and mostly stays in the gut. Neither the enemas nor suppositories helped me. I could never hold them and if you can't hold them you are not going to benefit. It would also be illogical for me to use such drugs now (enemas or suppositories) because I have inflammation from backwash stool ABOVE the pouch, and the inlet to my pouch is narrowed due to inflammation.
However, I take Pentasa as well as antibiotics, and Pentasa is another derivative of the same drug taken orally as blue capsules. I have taken Pentasa for many years, with antibiotics. These drugs have not been CURATIVE. They keep the pouchitis in a "simmering state", without eliminating it or stamping it out. I have been in "simmer" mode for 20 years. I suppose my J Pouch would have been cooked back in the 1990s without these drugs, so I do not complain.
I have been at this for 20 years with pouchitis, and there are very few things I have not tried (biologics being the main thing, although I was put on Imuran to treat UC in 1991, which was a disaster).