Dump the digital dunny doodling if you want to avoid ’rhoid rage.
The pioneer of the smartphone, Apple’s flawed genius Steve Jobs, has a lot to answer for.
While the upsides of having the wonders of the internet easily accessible in your pocket or handbag, the downside can be a real pain in the arse – and not just figuratively, as it transpires.
Thanks to new research from the US, published this week in PLOS One, we discover that scrolling your smartphone while sitting on the loo is not only frankly a disgusting habit (in our humble opinion), it also increases the risk of developing haemorrhoids.
While there has in the past been anecdotal claims linking digital doodling on the dunny (news to us, we might add) with anal piles, intrepid researchers from the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center have put the matter beyond doubt.
In their bid to get to the bottom of the matter, our boffins conducted a study of 125 adults who were undergoing screening colonoscopy.
The participants were asked to respond to online survey questions about their lifestyle and toilet habits, and endoscopists evaluated them for haemorrhoids.
Interestingly, around two-thirds of those surveyed reported using their smartphones while on the toilet, with the age profile skewing towards the younger folks being the chief offenders.
After statistically accounting for other factors thought to possibly be linked with haemorrhoid risk, such as exercise habits, age, and fibre intake, the researchers found participants who multi-tasked scrolling and pooping had a whopping 46% higher risk of developing those pesky piles than folks who stayed focussed on the job in hand.
Reading news and using social media were the most common smartphone activities undertaken on the toilet.
It’s important to point out at this stage that the research team have only established correlation and not causation, but the possible explanation mooted for the linkage is worth a mention.
The researchers point to their findings that time spent on the toilet was significantly higher for smartphone users than non-users; 37% of smartphone users spent more than five minutes at a time on the toilet compared with just 7.1% of non-users.
This leads them to suggest that using the smartphone may inadvertently prolong toilet time, potentially increasing pressure in anal tissues, which may then lead to haemorrhoids.
“This study bolsters advice to people in general to leave the smartphones outside the bathroom and to try to spend no more than a few minutes to have a bowel movement,” senior study author Dr Trisha Pasricha told media.
“If it’s taking longer, ask yourself why. Was it because having a bowel movement was really so difficult, or was it because my focus was elsewhere?”
Wise advice, indeed, but your Back Page scribbler suggests dunny doomscrollers ask themselves an additional question: “Why am I being so gross?”
Send story tips, preferably from hygienic locations, to Holly@medicalrepublic.com.au.
