Healthy Illinois woman, 30, suffers TERRIFYING and life-threatening side effect after taking birth control pill

A 'healthy' woman in Illinois began bleeding from her backside after suffering a rare and deadly complication of the pill.

The unnamed patient, 30, suffered the side effect for three weeks not long after starting birth control with progesterone, sometimes called the 'mini pill'. 

A colonoscopy revealed the rare bowel condition ischemic colitis, which occurs when blood flow gets cut off to parts of the large intestine. 

Without that circulation, parts of the bowel can die, leading to death. The doctors treating her said that it was only the second case of its kind. 

An unnamed patient, 30, suffered a bowel condition and rectal bleeding after taking progesterone-only birth control

In this image of the patient's colon, the researchers pointed out inflammation and tissue damage from ischemic colitis

The woman visited her local emergency room after three weeks of increasingly worse cramps, debilitating nausea, and blood diarrhea.

She had no underlying health issues but was obese and had been on the birth control for two months. 

She was diagnosed with ischemic colitis, which is most often caused by increased blood clotting in the abdomen and intestines. 

Recent research suggests that ischemic colitis is found in about 15 to 18 people per 100,000, or less than one percent of the population. 

READ MORE: Contraceptive pills change women's brains and make them risk takers, study suggests 

Oral birth control may alter the part of the brain responsible for emotion, anxiety and fear, possibly making women on the pill more likely to engage in unsafe behaviors. 

If left untreated, it can lead to gangrene - in which the bowel tissue dies - or death.

Experts are unsure how the progesterone-only pill caused the patient's condition. 

However, the researchers noted that birth control can lead to an increased risk of blood clotting, though the exact mechanism is unclear. 

'Despite the widespread usage of progesterone-only contraceptives, the occurrence of IC within this patient population remains unrecognized,' the team wrote. 

'The mechanism underlying progesterone-only contraceptives triggering ischemic events remains poorly understood, underscoring the need for further research and more vigilance in patients using progesterone-only contraceptives.'

Estrogen-containing contraceptives has been shown to increase the risk of a potentially life-threatening blood clots two to six-fold.

However, is no evidence to suggest that a woman's clot risk is raised on progesterone-only pills – and the same applies to those with hormonal or non-hormonal IUDs.

The researchers that their case is only the second documented instance of ischemic colitis linked to birth control, and the first to be shown with a biopsy. 

The patient was instructed to go off the birth control, and her symptoms improved in about two weeks. 

The case report was published last month in ACG Case Reports Journal.