If you don’t have hemorrhoids, they can be fun to crack jokes about. And while it’s true that hemroids might not be the worst thing that could happen to a person, it can cause itching, anal bleeding and in some more extreme cases a great deal of pain and discomfort.

If you do have itching, discomfort when using the bathroom, blood on the toilet paper or in the fecal material or any pain in the anal area, you may potentially have a hemroid condition, but a medical exam is necessary to rule out any potentially more dangerous conditions. Since the only way to see the whole colon is with an internal viewing, your doctor will probably recommend one of two procedures, a sigmoidoscopy or a colonoscopy. With a sigmoidoscopy, an endoscope is used to view the end of the colon, while with a colonoscopy, a tool called a colonoscope is used to see the large intestine.

Getting a colonoscopy sounds horrible, but it is a common procedure and you need to have it done anyway. You should start getting colonoscopys at the age of 50 or at the age of 40 if you have a higher risk. If the colonoscopy results look good the first time then a follow up exam every few years will be recommended. The laxative that is taken the day before the colonoscopy is the worst part. Prescribed laxatives do the job of removing material from the anal cavity in advance of the colonoscopy. This powerful laxative requires you to spend the day near a toilet. But other than that bit of unpleasantness the procedure itself is done under sedation so it’s not much of a worry.

Because more harmful diseases can seem like hemorrhoids, it is best to get the advice of a medical professional. These can include colon cancer, polyps, rectal cancer, Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis which are inflammatory bowel diseases. Other general problems with the anal cavity can be tears which are called anal fissures and anal abscesses which are infections next to the anus. In order to get a medical diagnosis, tests need to be done to rule out the more serious problems that can look like hemroids.

Since hemroid problems are much more common than the other medical conditions, it is more likely than not that your diagnosis will be hemorrhoids, but a doctor’s visit is necessary before you start any hemroid treatment. You deserve to have good colon health, so see to it with one simple doctor’s visit.