Why is my poo green?

It’s happened to a lot of us in some unspecified time in the future in our lives: we finish our bowel movement, look down within the bowl and have a moment of panic after we see an unusual color.

Poo could be present in many colors aside from brown, with green poo often eliciting concern. But it’s surprisingly common and is often no reason to be alarmed.

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Why poo is often brown

The brown color of poo initially comes from the red of blood. Haemoglobin is the red protein in blood that transports oxygen across the body. It’s eventually broken down right into a substance called bilirubin.

In the liver, bilirubin is used to form bile and is released into the small bowel to assist digest food. Bile then passes into the colon and the bilirubin is broken down by bacteria.

The final stage in the method is the addition of a substance called stercobilin, which supplies poo its brown color.

All shades of brown are considered normal.

Green poo in adults

Stool color could be very heavily influenced by the substances within the gut that digest food and what you eat.

Green stools contain significantly more bile acids than brown stools. If food is moving through the bowel in a short time – if you have got diarrhoea, as an example – there isn’t enough time for the green bile to interrupt down completely, giving stools a green color.

Green leafy vegetables equivalent to spinach and lettuce contain large amounts of chlorophyll (green pigment) sure to magnesium. This can result in stools turning green.

Some green food dyes equivalent to natural green 3 contain chlorophyll (green pigment) sure to copper which may turn stools a dark green.

Why do babies have green poo?

A newborn’s first stool, called meconium, could be very often dark green.

Green stools in formula-fed infants are sometimes resulting from formulas containing high amounts of iron.

But even for breastfed infants it’s normal to have yellow-green or green poo.

In fact, it’s normal for babies’ poo to be many alternative colors. One study found pale stools were attributable to partially digested milk fats, yellow stools were resulting from stercobilin (which can also be involved in making poo brown) and other similar compounds, and dark stools resulting from bilirubin or the presence of meconium.

What about other colors of poo?

Blue

Some food dyes, food additives and naturally occurring colors are unable to be completely broken down within the gut and this may distinctly color poo. Children who’ve consumed lots of blue-coloured drinks, as an example, often poo blue.

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Blueberries may also turn poo blue due to a kind of antioxidant called anthrocyanin. Most anthrocyanins in blue berries are broken down by the point they reach the colon, so kids with blue poo will either have consumed quite lots or the berries are moving quickly through the gut.

Children with diarrhoea have a really rapid gut transit and stools often come out the identical color because the food that went in.

Orange

Orange stools could be resulting from beta carotene, a compound found particularly vegetables equivalent to carrots and butternut pumpkin.

Poo can be orange due to the results of antacids containing aluminium hydroxide, a naturally occurring salt.

Yellow

Yellow-coloured poo is commonly normal but a greasy, foul-smelling yellow stool that floats on the bathroom water can mean it accommodates an excess of fat.

Occasionally, this may arise from conditions equivalent to undiagnosed coeliac disease, where the immune system reacts abnormally to gluten and the small bowel doesn’t properly absorb fat.

Pale, cream or clay-cloured

Abnormally pale or clay-coloured stools can indicate a blockage of bile from the liver to the small intestine. This means it doesn’t undergo the last stage of getting its brown color, through the addition of stercobilin. This leads to poo having a really distinct pale cream appearance.

One in 14,000 Australian babies are born with a condition called biliary atresia, where the bile ducts inside and outside the liver are scarred and blocked. Bile is unable to flow out of the liver, which may result in liver scarring. Biliary atresia could be treated with surgery but early diagnosis is vital.

Pale colored poo might also indicate the presence of an intestinal parasite or bacteria.

Red

Red poo might be resulting from red food colouring, tomato juice and beetroot.

However, vivid red blood within the poo often means internal bleeding from the bowel.

Causes of red blood within the poo can include conditions equivalent to haemorrhoids and anal fissures (small, thin tears) but stands out as the sign of a more sinister bowel cancer.

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Black

There could be numerous harmless causes for black poo equivalent to eating black licorice.

Medications are another excuse. Iron tablets and plenty of antibiotics can turn poo black. (Antibiotics are also known to show poo into different shades of green, white, pink and orange.)

Black, tar-like poo can indicate bleeding from higher up within the digestive tract, equivalent to from an oesophageal or stomach ulcer.

Should you be frightened?

Changes to the color of your poo are often temporary. Getting rid of the offender – by ending the medication or removing the responsible food from the weight loss plan, as an example – should give you the option to return poo color to its normal shade of brown.

If the odd color persists, it could signify an underlying medical condition and warrant further investigation.

Black, red and really pale poo are the more concerning colors and needs to be checked out by your GP.