Article Surfing Archive

Crohn's disease is an inflammatory bowel condition in which the entire gastrointestinal tract from the mouth to the anus can become inflamed until it is causes pain, destruction of the intestinal lining and excessive diarrhea.

If you are one of the many patients suffering with Crohn's disease it is important that you understand the causes of Crohn's disease so that you can make adjustments when possible to alleviate or at least reduce some of the symptoms.

There are many different theories that exist about what causes Crohn's disease; however, absolutely none of them have been proven 100% to prove the cause of Crohn's disease, which leads us to still wonder about the exact cause of Crohn's disease.

One of the more popular theories today for the cause of Crohn's disease is that the human body's immune system which is made from a variety of cells and proteins designed to protect us from infection actually act up and miss fires while acting abnormally in people with Crohn's disease.

The misbehaving immune system mistakes foods, bacteria, and other substances for being foreign. The normal response of the body's immune system is to attack these apparently foreign invaders as a way of protecting the body.

During an immune system attack the white blood cells in the body accumulate in the lining of the intestines producing chronic inflammation which leads to injury of the lining itself, up to and including deep ulcerations in the lining of the G.I. tract.

At this time scientists don't even know the abnormal functioning of the human immune system in those patients with Crohn's disease is the actual cause of Crohn's or if it is simply a result of the disease itself. It seems to be an issue about which came first the chicken or the egg?

Current medical research indicates that the edema and inflammation seen in the gastrointestinal tract of Crohn's disease sufferers involves many issues such as the genetic DNA that the person has inherited from their parents, the immune system itself, and the environment.

One possible cause of Crohn's disease is that the body may be naturally reacting to foreign substances found in the environment which then causes inflammation of the intestinal system.

There are some researchers who believe that a specific protein produced by the immune system may also be a cause for the inflammation associated with Crohn's disease. However, again we still do not know the exact cause of Crohn's disease.

This is also what ultimately causes it to be very difficult to adequately treat Crohn's disease.

So while it is a great topic to discuss, it is still painfully obvious that we do not know for sure the cause of Crohn's disease.

Research still needs to be conducted so that we can better determine the precise cause of the inflammation of the G.I. system associated this inflammatory bowel disease.