Feces Examination—A Specialty Of

One of the "specialties" of a medical technologist is to process feces for examination. If you don’t have a strong stomach, then you're really going to vomit… like me.

The collection of fecal specimen is not that easy for the patients. Containers are being provided and patients are needed to be instructed on how to properly collect the specimen from a clean container, like a bedpan for example, to a laboratory container for feces examination.

Patients have to bear in mind to prevent the specimen from combining with urine or defile it with water from the toilet that has disinfectants.

Bacteria, cellulose, gastrointestinal secretions, bile pigments, cells from the intestinal walls, electrolytes and water are the composition of a normal fecal specimen. Most of the bacteria found in normal feces are the normal flora of the intestines that help in the digestive process.

What causes the unpleasant odor of feces?

It’s the metabolism of bacteria that causes the strong odor of feces.
The introduction of pathogenic organisms will disturb the normal intestinal flora that resulted to diarrhea.

During constipation, the absorption of additional water from the fecal material takes longer and as a result small and hard stools are produced.

Hence, in order to avoid constipation, you have to eat a diet rich in fiber and drink plenty of water to facilitate in easy defecation.

Image from Flickr.com by obsessive compulsive photographer

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