What is the Irritable Bowel Medication Used in Drug Therapy?

Drug therapy is used in IBS for the moderate to severe affected patients, who do not respond to the physician counseling and dietary changes.

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Due to the lack of treatments to address multiple symptoms, traditionally the first step in helping IBS sufferers was aimed to resolve the main symptom.

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However, today there are therapies that have proved to be efficient in treating multiple symptoms.

#1  Type of Irritable Bowel Medication – Laxative

A laxative is an irritable bowel medication. There are four main types of laxatives: fiber, osmotic laxatives, stimulant laxatives and emollients.

Dietary fiber is usually the first method of treatment for patients with constipation IBS.

In case fiber laxatives is not effective, the next step would be the osmotic and stimulant laxatives.

Osmotic laxatives are poorly absorbed compounds that cause water to come into the small intestine and colon, by this increasing the stool bulk.

Stimulant laxatives are stimulating the nerves of the large intestine and reduce the water absorbed from the GI content. The effect of this type of laxative is felt within hours.

Emollients are stool softeners.

#2  Type of Irritable Bowel Medication – Anticholinergic/Antispasmodic agents

After laxatives, the second group of irritable bowel medication consists of antispasmodic agents. But studies haven’t shown real effects in the overall population. In the research done it was noticed a small difference compared to placebo, and that only to a few antispasmodic, which are not found in USA.

#3  Type of Irritable Bowel Medication – Antidiarrheal agents

Antidiarrheal agents are used as irritable bowel medication for patients with diarrhea IBS. But these irritable bowel medication doesn’t relieve pain and cause constipation.

#4  Type of Irritable Bowel Medication – Antidepressant medications

The reason for using this irritable bowel medication is the effect it has on the gut flora and motility, plus the fact that IBS usually coexists with psychological distress symptoms.

Tricyclic antidepressants (like nortriptyline, amitriptyline and desipramine) taken in low doses have proved to be efficacious in treating IBS, particularly in those with mainly diarrhea. They have multiple effects that can be beneficial in relieving abdominal pain and altering gut motility. Some of the newer serotonin-norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRI’s, e.g., duloxetine) have fewer side effects and may be helpful for IBS symptoms but are not as well studied.

#5  Type of Irritable Bowel Medication – New serotonin agents

There are newer irritable bowel medications that proved to be efficient in treating IBS in high standard clinical trials. Two of these irritable bowel medications are peripheral serotonergic agents (i.e., they act on serotonin receptors in the body, which help transmit nerve messages within the gut).

Serotonin (5-HT) is one irritable bowel medication that helps to regulate bowel function. There are a several types of 5-HT receptors.

Two of most known drugs containing serotonin are:

  • Alosetron ( Lotronex) – used for diarrhea-predominant IBS
  • Tegaserod (Zelnorm) – used for constipation-predominant IBS

Alosetron ( Lotronex) is a drug that has effect on certain type of gut receptor. This drug has been approved for the use of women with severe diarrhea-predominant IBS. It is only prescribed under restricted use due to rare but potentially serious side effects.

The drug Tegaserod (Zelnorm) targets a different type of receptor in the gut, which helps promote peristalsis, the coordinated muscle contractions that push content through the GI. Tegaserod has been shown to be effective for treating constipation symptoms.

It was initially approved for use in women with IBS where constipation is the predominant bowel symptom, and subsequently in men and women with chronic constipation (without predominant abdominal pain) under the age of 65.

Lotronex is a prescription medications intended for specific use under a doctor’s supervision; Lotronex is no longer available in the U.S. duet o its side effects.

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