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Pediatric Gastroenterology (PD)
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Specialty Description

Pediatric gastroenterology is concerned with treating the gastrointestinal tract, liver and pancreas of children from infancy through the teen years.

This field covers the entire gastrointestinal tract including the hepatobiliary-pancreatic systems and nutritional disorders. Specifically, patients may have a wide array of disorders ranging from acute or chronic disorders, low or high acuity problems. Pediatric gastroenterologist also performs a variety of endoscopic and other diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. Some patients have liver failure requiring artificial liver support or hepatic transplant, while others have short bowel syndrome and intestinal failure requiring chronic intravenous nutrition, enteral tube feeding, or small intestinal or multivisceral transplant. Pediatric gastroenterologists typically work collaboratively with dieticians, speech therapists, psychologists, endocrinologists, pulmonologists, otolaryngologists, surgeons, other subspecialists, and primary care doctors to provide ongoing subspecialty care for their patients.