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Hi. My name is John, and I am a 24-year old student at the University of Cambridge, Department of Medicine. During my life I have dealt many time with hemorrhoids. My father and my grandfather also suffered from this disease, as well as many other friends of mine. There where times when I was trying to find out more about hemorrhoids, but the sites that I found on internet were filled with commercials and ads. I decided to build this site as a complete hemorrhoid resource on internet, so that people like me to find what they need. |
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Very few diseases are referred to by so many names as Hemorrhoids. These are some of the variants of the name that are used by people searching for information on the disease, its causes and symptoms, cures and treatments: piles (used to describe this disease for more than a century, an alternative name), hemroids (the most common misspell, used often by people), hemorhoids (with a single ‘r’), hemorroids (without the silent ‘h’ in the middle). Other common typo’s might be: hemmroids, hemoroids, hemeroids, hemerroids, hameroids, hammeroids, hemmoroids, hemmeroids, hemmorhoids and hemorrhoides.
You may ask what is correct spelling, it is of course, hemorrhoids – a common name in some medicine circles. Occasionally, haemorrhoids is also used, especially by doctors. The last one is an older term, seldom used in medical publications.
According to some estimates, 40% to 50% of people all over the world, who are more than 50 years of age, suffer from this disease. This does not mean that younger people can’t get it. There is just less probability and another interesting thing, more males then females suffer from hemorrhoids. Most cases of ladies affected by hemorrhoids are associated with the increased pressure on the anal region caused by the pregnancy. In the USA, for example, the prevalence is about 4.4%. In a year, almost half a million people in the U.S. are treated for hemorrhoids, with 10 to 20% of them requiring surgeries.
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Another fact is that all of us have hemorrhoids and it is perfectly normal to have them, but only when they are noticeable - they don’t remain out of sight, and show signs and symptoms, we say that the person has hemorrhoids. |
In almost all the cases, hemorrhoids are embarrassing. When they first show themselves, the usual reactions are fear, shock and concern. Hemorrhoids appear when the fibers, tissues, arteries and the muscles containing blood vessels become disturbed. It causes bleeding through the anus while passing the stool. One common symptom of hemorrhoids is the bleeding. The blood that comes out is bright red in color and not the usual dark red. This would seem to most of us very strange, and we could panic even more. Actually, this happens because of the presence of the arteries in the area. Dark red blood is found in the veins, not the arteries. What you see is arterial blood and due to the presence of the arteries in the anal area, bleeding can be quite severe.
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The important thing at this moment is to calm down. All hemorrhoids are swollen blood vessels and for most people, they are easily cured or relieved. We have built this site to provide you all information about hemorrhoids and to help you through this ‘not so good’ period of your life. In right we have an old English painting. You can see in the left corner a hemorrhoid surgery. |
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In most cases, having hemorrhoids is an embarrassing problem; we usually are most sensitive about that part of our body. The last thing we want to do is talk to people about it; even friends are mostly out of the question. Even talking to doctors about hemorrhoids can sometimes be embarrassing. There are some cases where the shame may be amplified even more, if we believe we have caused hemorrhoids through a sexual act. Unfortunately, many patients who initially seek relief through the use of a nonprescription product will need to refer to a physician. You have to understand that doctors and surgeons are discussing the topic of hemorrhoids almost every day with their patients (because hemorrhoids are very common), they are interested in telling you what to do and think of the problem professionally, not personally. The most important thing is to get the correct diagnosis and hemorrhoid treatment options, and this can be achieved only by talking with your doctor and telling him every symptom that you have. Self-diagnosis of hemorrhoids is difficult, and NOT RECOMMENDED. A non-medical person may confuse hemorrhoids with other things like: abscess, warts, anal fissure, anal prolepses or even cancer. We have a site section included to assist you, but medical examination is strongly suggested. Patients should consult their physician if nonprescription treatments do not resolve the problem within seven days.
The standard hemorrhoid classification is dependent on the point of origin of the problem. There are mainly 2 types of hemorrhoids: internal and external. When hemorrhoids appear outside the anus, they are referred to as external hemorrhoids (they originate below the dentate line). This is easier to identify, usually from the bleeding and itching. Internal hemorrhoids are found inside the rectum and, needless to say, since there are no symptoms from the outside, they are harder to identify. One way to get a suspicion of those is from the bleeding that may come while passing stool.
Another classification would be thrombosed hemorrhoids and prolapsed ones. When there is a blood clot in the anal area due to a rupture, the condition is known as thrombosed hemorrhoids. This happens only from external hemorrhoids and when the internal hemorrhoids extend to such an extent they jut out from the anus, then they are known as prolapsed hemorrhoids.
Now that we have covered all aspects, we will detail them on the other sections of our site.