# Is it possible for a person to never fart?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-for-a-person-to-never-fart/559447>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [November 4, 2010, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-for-a-person-to-never-fart/559447 "2010-11-04T13:33:18Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![brossa](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/brossa/32/3040_2.png) [@brossa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/brossa)\
**Post date:** [November 14, 2010, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-it-possible-for-a-person-to-never-fart/559447/41 "2010-11-14T19:25:15Z")

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> [@Ionizer](#):
>
> Just an example of what ‘retained gas’ can do to ya: I had a patient come through X-ray once with extreme shortness-of-breath and she was panting/gasping just to keep from going blue(r), trust me. She’d had some type of minor rectal surgery a week or so before, but all was well to that point. She did not tell anyone she had not pooped and/or farted since surgery, of course. She literally looked pregnant - I was first one to actually lay eyes on her at hospital, fwiw, in defense of the Doc saying it was an asthma attack, hence the Chest film).
> 
> I took the PA Chest film and looked at it, and her colon (whole thing) was HUGE - displaced most everything in her belly and pushed her diaphragm/lungs upwards to point where she could not really inhale. Doc said the depressurization, through a little barium-enema tip inserted ‘manually’, took a looooong time. Stunk up quite a bit of first-floor of that side of hospital, too. I just can’t imagine the pSi present in that colon.
> 
> If you did not fart, at some point, it’d get problematic (probably) 🙂

Sounds like [Ogilvie’s Syndrome](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ogilvie%27s_syndrome). In residency I saw a man who had had an infected total knee joint replacement removed; he was on strict bed rest for several days and his belly got bigger and bigger each day, to the point that his breathing was compromised as well. Unfortunately, his upright chest film showed free air in his abdomen; his colon had perforated. During surgery, no mechanical obstruction was found - it was strictly a dysmotility problem. I don’t recall whether he survived.

Ogilvie syndrome is typically treated by decompressing the colon, either by medical stimulation of the colon or by mechanical decompression with a colonoscope or suchlike. One of the old docs I knew recommended ‘The Position’, in which the patient was placed on hands and knees, head down, butt up in the air. After a few minutes of this, many patients relaxed to the point that they’d start to decompress in a looooooooooooooooooong, low, whistling toot. The problem being, that most of the patients who developed Ogilivie’s couldn’t tolerate getting into that position due to incisions, pain, etc.

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