Do you want to travel with Crohn's disease and need to know what to consider? Not all travel insurance provide coverage to cover pre-existing conditions, but at Fit 2 Trip we can offer travel insurance to many customers even with previous medical circumstances or conditions.
If you want to travel with an inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), whether it's Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis, you'll probably want to know if this could affect your trip. Therefore, planning a trip in advance is important if you suffer from chronic diseases.
To avoid possible unforeseen events during the trip, it is advisable to travel with inflammatory bowel disease in periods of remission or inactivity of the disease.
In fact, time changes, weather or even the stress of the trip itself can affect when traveling with Crohn's disease, and it is therefore important to plan the trip in advance.
Crohn's disease is a chronic and autoimmune inflammatory affectation of the digestive tract that evolves and presents recurrently through outbreaks of unknown cause.
Its main symptoms include fever, weight loss, diarrhea, abdominal pain, rectal bleeding, among others.
This disease can affect from the mouth to the anus. However, the most common location is the terminal ileum, that is, the most distal part of the small intestine.
However, the symptoms depend on the severity of the inflammation and the anatomical location, but its most frequent symptom is diarrhea and abdominal pain on the right side accompanied by fever.
The specific causes of Crohn's disease are not known, but there are many hypotheses that suggest that multiple factors are involved in its origin.
Today, the prognosis is uncertain, since there is no cure. As a general rule, those people who suffer from this disease have a good quality of life in their day to day, carrying out a normal life.
Anyone can travel with Crohn's disease with a number of considerations and a travel insurance policy that covers these types of chronic intestinal problems.
Regarding the prognosis, it is generally related to the time of diagnosis of the disease, that is, its evolution and progression since it was diagnosed, the severity of the outbreaks and the existence or not of complications.
If you plan to take a trip in the summer, the concern about traveling with Ulcerative Colitis or Crohn's disease is greater. For this, it is necessary to plan more and take out pre-existing illness travel insurance to avoid problems during the holidays.
To travel with intestinal diseases it is important to plan before starting your vacation. For this, the Conference of Associations of Crohn's and Ulcerative Colitis Patients gives a series of tips:
It is essential to tell your doctor the destination, the date and the duration of the trip a few weeks or months in advance. In this way, the doctor can indicate the need for a specific vaccine, diagnostic test or treatment.
Likewise, before traveling with Ulcerative Colitis or Crohn's disease, you should find out about the vaccination required by the country of destination, which may be incompatible with the medication.
Take your health records with relevant information about the disease you are suffering from and the appropriate medication you are taking. In addition, this report must include the telephone number and email address of the contact health center in case of complications.
When traveling with intestinal diseases, such as Crohn's disease or Ulcerative Colitis, it is advisable to travel with medical insurance that covers pre-existing diseases.
Therefore, it is essential to select a company that offers travel insurance that covers previous illnesses. In Fit 2 Trip, you will find a policy which will cover existing medical conditions enabling you to enjoy the trip, even if you have an existing medical condition such as Crohn’s disease or Ulcerative Colitis..
If treatment is required to control the immune response, it is advisable to record your medications on a card in English.
It is advisable to know how the country of destination ensures the quality and safety of healthcare when traveling with Crohn's disease or Ulcerative Colitis. Likewise, be aware of the necessary actions in the event of an outbreak of the disease.
Once you have planned the trip in advance, it is important to take into account the type of drink and food, depending on the destination. In tropical countries, raw food should not be eaten and hygiene measures should be taken to avoid symptoms.
It is also not convenient to drink stimulating drinks such as tea or coffee. In the case of suffering an outbreak, hydration is essential. It must be taken into account that a phase of dehydration can be difficult to differentiate with gastroenteritis.
When you return from your trip, you should visit your doctor to perform a stool study or a blood test and check that there have been no complications in the disease.
To make a trip with Crohn's disease or Ulcerative Colitis in a calm way, you can prepare a Kit in your hand luggage with everything you need in case of an outbreak, but, at the same time, have a travel policy which covers existing medical conditions as it is essential for the protection of your trip and your health.
At Fit 2 Trip we offer different levels of coverage, according to the needs of each traveler, available for couples, individual travelers and groups.