Inflammatory bowel disease1. Describe the pathophysiology of your chosen disease – What is the disease spectrum/disease pathology? Is the disease characterized by inflammation, etc.? ? Is it an infectious and/or chronic disease? If so, what is the agent, its reservoir, its mode of transmission, etc.? Inflammatory bowel disease is a chronic condition characterized by inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract (Wolf, CDC, Mayo clinic, Health Direct, NHS Choices). Patients suffering from inflammatory bowel disease usually face severe chronic stomach pain, diarrhea that may contain blood, loss of appetite, joint pain, skin problems , fever, fatigue, etc. Symptoms may appear for a period of time and may appear in different severity depending on the case (Wolf). Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis are two main categories of inflammatory bowel diseases. Ulcerative colitis usually occurs in the mucous membranes of the large intestine. It causes swelling and ulcers to form in the affected areas. In extreme cases, this can cause a whole to appear in the large intestine traces. In these cases, immediate emergency surgery is necessary. Less than half of patients with ulcerative colitis typically require surgery at some point in their lives (CDC). Unlike ulcerative colitis, Crohn's disease is not limited to one region of the gastrointestinal tract, although it has been shown to be more dominant in the small intestine. Crohn's disease causes swelling and thickening of scar tissue in the affected areas. Crohn's disease usually also appears in areas where some areas are affected by Crohn's disease and others are not. Like ulcerative colitis, in extreme cases, Crohn's disease can cause holes to appear middle of paper ......ntroduction.aspx>Health direct Australia. Crohn's disease and colitis, 2013. Web. May 5, 2014. Ghosh, Subrata and Almadi, Majid. “Inflammatory bowel disease: a global disease”. Saudi Journal of Gastroenterology: Official Journal of the Saudi Association of Gastroenterology (2013). Internet. May 5, 2014Mayo Clinic. Diseases and Conditions Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), 2012. Web. May 5, 2014Rubin, Deborah; Shaker, Anisa; and Levin, Marc. “Chronic intestinal inflammation: inflammatory bowel disease and colitis-associated cancer.” Frontiers in Immunology (2012). Internet. May 5 2014.