If your stomach is growling, it may not be because you are hungry. Be careful of these 4 situations!

In movies, TV shows or literary works, the rumbling stomach is often used to indicate that the person is hungry.

It is especially embarrassing when the protagonist says he is not hungry but his stomach growls at an inopportune time.

In fact, this may not be scientific.

A growling stomach may not necessarily mean that you are hungry. It may also be a sign of gastrointestinal problems, which can be very dangerous.

In medicine, this gurgling sound of the stomach is called "bowel sound", which is the sound made by the movement of the intestines.

If your stomach growls but you don’t feel hungry at all, it means you have just eaten.

It may be that you have eaten food that is difficult to digest, or your body cannot digest what you have eaten. For example, people who are lactose intolerant will have a very loud stomach growling after drinking milk, and then have diarrhea.

When you are constipated, your stomach may also growl.

This situation is considered to be caused by poor gastrointestinal motility or gastrointestinal dysfunction.

You can use some probiotics and laxatives to promote bowel movements. At the same time, you should pay attention to adjusting your diet, eat more vegetables and fruits, and drink more water.

A growling stomach and diarrhea at the same time may be caused by indigestion, unclean diet, cold abdomen, etc.

But be careful: if you often have diarrhea, abdominal pain, and a growling stomach, it may be a gastrointestinal disease.

For example, gastrointestinal bleeding, irritable bowel syndrome, infectious diarrhea, ulcerative colitis, etc., need to go to the hospital for treatment and start treatment from the root cause instead of just taking antidiarrheal drugs.

Mechanical intestinal obstruction refers to the blockage of the intestine by fecal matter, gallstones, or tumors.

In order to increase peristalsis, the intestines will also make gurgling sounds. If the intestinal contraction continues to intensify, it will cause abdominal cramps. Then the bowel sounds in the stomach will also become abnormal, similar to ding-dong sounds, or even sound like metal, which may occur more than 10 times a minute (if listened to with a stethoscope). This situation is quite dangerous [1].

It may cause symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, and abdominal distension. If the intestines are completely blocked, the discharge of gas and bowel movements will stop and may even be life-threatening.

In most cases, there is nothing wrong with rumbling intestinal sounds, and there is no need to worry too much.

In order to reduce your own wild thoughts, regular physical examinations are very important, especially for older friends who have never had a colonoscopy. You can arrange a check-up. If the intestinal sounds are abnormal and accompanied by other serious conditions, such as abdominal pain, diarrhea, and abdominal distension, it is better to seek timely diagnosis and treatment.

So, next time your stomach growls, don’t just think of it as being hungry. It would be awkward if someone else’s stomach growled and they were about to have diarrhea, and you invited them to dinner.

References

[1]Taylor MR, Lalani N. Adult small bowel obstruction. Acad Emerg Med. 2013 Jun;20(6):528-44.

Author: Lina