Beltrán VP, Carretero C, Gonzalez-Suárez B, Fernández-Urien I, Muñoz-Navas M. Intestinal preparation prior to capsule endoscopy administration. World J Gastroenterol 2008; 14(37): 5773-5775 [PMID: 18837100 DOI: 10.3748/wjg.14.5773]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Dr. Vicente Pons Beltrán, MD, PhD, Servicio de Medicina Digestiva, Hospital Universitari La Fe, Avda. Campanar 21, Valencia 46009, Spain. pons_vicbel@gva.es
Article-Type of This Article
Letters To The Editor
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Cristina Carretero, Miguel Muñoz-Navas, Iñaqui Fernandez-Urien, Gastroenterology Department, University of Navarra, Pamplona 31008, Spain
Begoña Gonzalez-Suarez, Gastroenterology Department, Hospital del Mar, Barcelona 08036, Spain
Author contributions: All the authors contributed equally to this work.
Correspondence to: Dr. Vicente Pons Beltrán, MD, PhD, Servicio de Medicina Digestiva, Hospital Universitari La Fe, Avda. Campanar 21, Valencia 46009, Spain. pons_vicbel@gva.es
Telephone: +34-96-1973233 Fax: +34-96-1973118
Received: February 15, 2008 Revised: August 26, 2008 Accepted: September 2, 2008 Published online: October 7, 2008
Abstract
In order to have an adequate view of the whole small intestine during capsule endoscopy, the preparation recommended consists of a clear liquid diet and an overnight fast. However, visualization of the small bowel during video capsule endoscopy can be impaired by intestinal contents. To improve mucosal visualization, some authors have evaluated different regimens of preparation. There is no consensus about the necessity of intestinal preparation for capsule endoscopy and it should be interesting to develop adequate guidelines to improve its efficacy and tolerability. Moreover, the effect of preparation type (purgative) on intestinal transit time is not clear. Since a bowel preparation cannot definitively improve its visibility (and theoretically the yield of the test), it is not routinely recommended.
