Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards

In the US, about 70% of the people diagnosed with IBS are women. There are various theories about this - one suggests that women are more likely to have the disorder because hormonal fluctuations can play a role, and women have more hormonal fluctuations than men. Another theory says that women are simply more likely to be diagnosed because they're more apt to see a doctor about the problem in the first place. So there may actually be just as many men out there with IBS as women, but they're invisible.

Interestingly, in India the men with IBS outnumber the women, which suggests that the second theory may be more accurate. People aren't counted as having an illness until they report the symptoms - if men are less likely to visit the doctor in the US, but women are less likely to visit the doctor in India, this could be skewing the statistics both ways.

I do hear from more women than men, but the men are definitely out there. And what's really unfortunate is that they're being totally ignored in most current research. The major pharmaceutical companies are conducting drug trials on women only at this point, so new drugs that come to market aren't even approved for men. They can be prescribed to men, but they aren't likely to have been tested on them at all. Given that this research is thus ignoring, at a minimum, one third of the IBS sufferers, I think this is awful.

Best,
Heather

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Heather is the Administrator of the IBS Message Boards. She is the author of Eating for IBS and The First Year: IBS, and the CEO of Heather's Tummy Care. Join her IBS Newsletter. Meet Heather on Facebook!

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