Fight the Fire of Crohn's Disease: Quit Smoking!
04/16/01
April 16, 2001 -- Having Crohn's disease reminds 20-year-old Matt Green of the sci-fi flick Alien -- specifically the scenes where the alien bursts out of a character's stomach.
"Except that the alien never emerges. It just keeps pushing and pushing against the stomach," says Green, a computer science major and webmaster of the Teens With Crohn's Disease web site. "It's like a stomach flu that never goes away."
The pain of Crohn's disease can occur randomly or be triggered by eating the wrong food or by stress, explains Green. For many people with the disease, medications and diet can relieve most of this irritating abdominal pain. But smokers with Crohn's disease may have yet another option for pain relief -- kicking the habit.
Cigarettes
