Etiology of lower gastrointestinal bleeding in Sulaimani governorate-Kurdistan region-Iraq-retrospective cross-sectional study

Abstract Background Acute lower gastrointestinal bleeding is arbitrarily defined as bleeding of less than 3 days in duration, while chronic lower gastrointestinal bleeding is the passage of blood from the rectum over a period of several days or longer and usually implies that blood loss is intermittent or slow. Objectives To find the causes of lower gastrointestinal bleeding and to find the commonest cause to raise awareness of the gastroenterologist personnel, surgeons and internists. Patients and methods The study was conducted as a retrospective cross-sectional study, 734 patients from a total number of 854 patients, underwent colonoscopy in Kurdistan Center for Gastroenterology and Hepatology in Sulaimani governorate, Kurdistan region-Iraq, were recruited, it took a period of 10 months; from 2nd January 2018 to 31st October in 2018. Clinical examination, digital rectal examination, and colonoscopy with biopsy were arranged for each patient. Results Bleeding due to hemorrhoid was the most frequent diagnosis (n = 211, 28.74%) which reported during colonoscopy, which was more common in males (n = 113, 15.3%) than females (n = 98, 13.3%) with female to male ratio of (0.86). Conclusion The most common cause of lower gastrointestinal bleeding in the area is hemorrhoid. Colonoscopy is superior to physical and digital rectal examination in detecting cause of bleeding in lower GIT bleeding