First of all, speak with your doctor. If you’re taking an opioid for pain, then constipation is likely to happen, and your doctor can help – it’s nothing to be embarrassed about.
Many healthcare professionals use the Rome IV Criteria to help diagnose whether your pain medication is causing opioid induced constipation.1
Your healthcare provider will assess whether you have two or more of the following symptoms1,2:
You have to strain a lot when you try to have a bowel movement
It feels like there might be something blocking your back passage
Your poo becomes very dry and is hard or lumpy (numbers 1 and 2 on the Bristol Stool Chart below)
You have fewer than 3 bowel movements in a week
You feel like you haven’t quite gotten everything out when you go to the toilet
Bristol Stool Chart3
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Type 1
Separate hard lumps, like nuts (hard to pass)
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Type 2
Sausage-shaped but lumpy
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Type 3
Like a sausage but with cracks on its surface
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Type 4
Like a sausage or snake, smooth and soft
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Type 5
Soft blobs with clear-cut edges (passed easily)
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Type 6
Fluffy pieces with ragged edges, a mushy Stool
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Type 7
Watery, no solid pieces. Entirely liquid
