Chronic ulcerative colitis; proctologic interpretation and treatment.

Since proctologic practice includes the study, diagnosis and treatment of all pathologic conditions of the large bowel, it is not unusual to find segmented areas of large portions of the colon involved in advanced stages of inflammatory disease. This is primarily revealed by careful history, thorough physical examination, and sigmoidoscopic findings, aided by the double contrast air enema and the laboratory examinations of smears and cultures taken from these infected parts. Such familiar pictures, in contradistinction to the acute forms of the disease, are variously spoken of as nonspecific, chronic ulcerative, thromboulcerative or idiopathic colitis. My own belief is that a combined designation (chronic nonspecific ulcerative colitis) is the most practical term, particularly when reporting this diagnostic condition to the general practitioner. A detailed description of the pathologic and clinical picture involving the colonic mucosa in this disease would be time consuming, but a review of the splendid efforts of