Behold, the Bristol Stool Scale! Leading medical authorities rely on it to assess patient health and colon function, particularly in those patients complaining of significant digestive disorders.
Types may range widely in healthy patients too, but tend to cluster between Types 2 and 5, with Types 3 and 4 being considered ideal. Type 1 stools usually mean one is on opioids or other bowel-slowing meds, or has some sort of motility disorder. Type 7 stools generally indicate a severe secretory diarrhea or use of an osmotic agent.
Types 1 and 2 are more prevalent in females, while types 5 and 6 are more prevalent in males, at least in the study population which established this scale.
So, how do you rate, on a normal, average day?
Please check out the link above so you may provide the most accurate info in the Poll which shall follow.
Past threads on this topic were pre-polling. I’m hoping for better data this go-around.
Alas my autonomic nervous system is faulty and has decided my intestines shall have two speeds, stopped or Lucy-and-Ethel-at-the-end-of-the-Candy-Wrapping-scene. That gives typical stool types of 1 or 7. Today is a 7. Ugh.
I presume I don’t have to put TMI spoilers for this thread, right? That sentence is the only warning you’re going to get.
Does anyone actually have a consistent level though? Mine has always fluctuated depending on various factors. Even what I would consider standard depends on the week or the month. (Note, IBS runs in the family.)
It also seems to leave out one type that is more gel-like. No hard pieces, but not really liquid, either. Kinda the consistency of peanut butter. I guess I could file that under “fluffy/mushy,” but that never seems to agree with the pictures I see of it.
I might not be much of a swinger, but my bowels certainly are. I can go from a 1 to a 7 in a single movement. And to top it off, I’m irregularly irregular.
Type 1: Dehydrated, no veggies or lots of cheese
Type 2: No Fiber (Eat Vegetables!)
Type 3 & 4: Normal
Type 5: Mexican Food with lots of green sauce
Type 6: Beer
Type 7:Full blown alcoholic.
I’d say 5 is average for me, with forays into 4 and 6. Occasional 7’s with no understanding of what causes it, since my diet doesn’t change that much.
This is more than even I want to know about my stools.
Hijack: I find that modern low-flow toilets make it hard to tell if there is anything wrong with my stools, as my PCP asks me at every physical. This is because there is so little water and the bowl directs everything into such a small space at the bottom, there’s very little to see. I guess this is an unintended consequence of water conservation. End of hijack.
One place where my stool has become exceptional is flotation; I usually have to “bucket flush” to get it all down. Every time. In 50% of the toilets I’ve crossed paths with. It floats like a cork. It started about 6-8 years back and I blame it on one of the medications I was changed to around that time. I’ve mentioned it to my doc several times and she has taken samples; nothing she is concerned with has shown up. But it does get annoying to say the least.
Which is me after a chilli-free meal in an Indian restaurant.
