Amebic Colitis

Depending on the affected organ, the clinical manifestations of amebiasis are intestinal or extraintestinal. There are four clinical forms of invasive intestinal amebiasis, all of which are generally acute: dysentery or bloody diarrhea, fulminating colitis, amebic appendicitis, and ameboma of the colon. Dysenteric and diarrheic syndromes account for 90% of cases of invasive intestinal amebiasis. Patients with dysentery have an average of three to five mucosanguineous evacuations per day, with moderate colic pain preceding discharge, and they have rectal tenesmus. In patients with bloody diarrhea, evacuations are also few but the stools are composed of liquid fecal material stained with blood. While there is moderate colic pain, there is no rectal tenesmus. Fever and systemic manifestations are generally absent. These syndromes constitute the classic ambulatory dysentery and can easily be distinguished from that of bacterial origin, where the patient frequently complains of systemic signs and symptoms such as fever, chills, headache, malaise, anorexia, nausea, vomiting, cramping abdominal pain, and tenesmus.