Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Overview of gastrointestinal complications including constipation, diarrhea, nausea, and vomiting, feeding tube complications, bowel perforation and obstruction, and neutropenic enterocolitis

Microbes have always been thought to be a critical inhabitant of the colobine gastrointestinal tract given their ability to break down the fiber and toxins often associated with a leafy diet. In this chapter, we summarize current knowledge of the colobine gut microbiome and propose topics for future study. We begin by describing the composition and function of the colobine hindgut microbiome as it compares to other primates, as well as ruminants. Next we explore the microbiome as a tool for understanding and assessing colobine health outcomes both in captivity and in response to degradation of habitats in the wild. Finally, we outline some best practices and caveats for future studies of the colobine gut microbiome more generally. Although there is currently a dearth of studies describing colobine host-gut microbe interactions, existing data suggest that the potential for the gut microbiome to influence colobine health, ecology, and evolution is great.

Infectious diseases of the lower gastrointestinal tract are caused by a vast array of viral, bacterial, fungal, and parasitic organisms. Pathologists are often called upon to distinguish infectious enterocolitis from other inflammatory disorders and, when possible, identify the causative pathogen or group of pathogens. Thus, pathologists should be aware of the patterns of injury and morphologic features that suggest infectious enterocolitides and should be able to generate a reasonable but narrow differential diagnosis that guides clinical management. This chapter reviews the clinical, gross, and, microscopic features of common and emerging infectious diseases of the lower gastrointestinal tract and emphasizes the pathologic findings that aid the appropriate classification of these diseases in daily practice.

The seventh chapter, “An Era of Optimism,” analyzes the new culture of sanitation practices that helped to define modernity. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, those living in the developed world became accustomed to wearing shoes, using toilet paper, bathing regularly with soap, and utilizing refrigeration systems to extend the life of foods. In the mid-twentieth century, populations in the Global North benefited from population-wide vaccination programs against poliomyelitis, the prevalence of which seemed to have increased as a result of the implementation of better sanitation systems. Based on the "hygiene hypothesis," many specialists believed that poliomyelitis was rare in regions without modern sanitation. This was not the case. Regrettably, polio vaccination did not begin in the developing world until the 1970s. Oral rehydration therapy, a major breakthrough in the treatment of diarrheal disease, saved millions of lives.

The first chapter, “Pathogens and Parasites,” introduces the major helminthic, protozoal, viral, and bacterial intestinal disease agents, and it provides estimates of their current prevalence and contribution to the burden of human disease. The chapter discusses the biological and social determinants of infectious intestinal disease transmission, and it makes the point that, although a range of hygienic practices can have a significant influence on transmission, owing to a range of ecological and cultural variables, few universal rules apply. It discusses some recent findings from the microbiome project that provide new ways of thinking about infectious intestinal disease, and it makes the case that a deeper understanding of the historical epidemiology of infectious intestinal diseases can potentially improve the public health outcomes from contemporary interventions.