Pepto-Bismol - Still Black stool after kaopectate 4 days ago. Any cause of concern?

Hey Dzoo,

Maybe Kaopectate comes in 2 different formulations nowadays. I'll tell you why. Some years ago Kaopectate was kaolin & Pectin, as you said. I even had an Earth Science teacher that told us basically Kaopectate is clay, and that's why it works the way it does. That made sense to me. Because I always found that if you drink enough of it, everything inside you finally becomes solidified. And that could take almost a whole bottle, if you had very bad IBS. Pepto works in a different way.

It's just occurring to me this person didn't say this is a wds, I just assumed it, because the way he/she described this has happened to me as a wds. I had come off a very high dose of pain meds, and what was coming out wasn't anything like a stool. It was just black liquid, and oozing is a great way to describe it. I never tried those other things for foods, for this condition. So I just ate fried rice. It worked.

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So now this all happened last Winter. The Kaopectate I had was a few years old. After I took it the Kao didn't have the Kaolin taste. So I looked at the label. Sure enough is said bismuth subsalicylate. I had Pepto and I compared. It was the same thing. It was cherry flavored Kaopectate, but I don't see why that should matter. I was very disappointed. Having suffered with IBS most of my life I know a few things about uncontrollable diarrhea. I know there are times bismuth subsalicylate works best, and there are other times, the clay like Kaolin and Pectin work best. Last year was a time for the Kaolin and Pectin. Because all the bismuth subsalicylate did was turn the liquid black. It may have slowed it down a little, but not much. I think I finally took 18 mg of Imodium at once, and that stopped it awhile. But the only long lasting cure came when I went back on Bupe. It still took several days. But finally I was ok again.

I have a small pharmacy across the street, and they only had 1 or 2 other bottles of Kao. I checked them and they also had bismuth subsalicylate in them. I never really checked in CVS or large supermarkets. I certainly hope the original Kao is still made. It was good stuff.

When was the last time you bought some of the original formula? The one with bismuth subsalicylate was purchased in 2007 or 08.