E. Coli: Symptoms and Causes – Dr. Norman Swan

by | First Aid and Self-Care, Gastrointestinal Health

E. Coli
E.coli are generally friendly bugs that live in our guts, but sometimes they turn dangerous and cause diarrhoea and other illnesses. The only way to know if you have e.coli is for doctors to culture your poo or blood, so it’s important to see a doctor if these symptoms prevail.

We all have lots of E. Coli, essential E. coli in our bodies, and most E. Coli bugs are harmless and just live there and we live with them very well. But there are some E. Coli which are called pathogenic.

In other words, they can cause disease and the disease is usually diarrhoea, a form of diarrhoea. But it also can get into your bloodstream and cause Septicemia so that you can get quite serious infections with E. Coli. There’s no way from the symptoms really that you would know that you had E. Coli infection.

It’s usually from culturing the poo or culturing your blood that you discover that you’ve got E. Coli infection. So it’s nothing particular about E. Coli.

Dr Norman Swan, Physician and Journalist