Revista de Gastroenterología de México 2010;Supl.2(75):271-273 www.elsevier.es

Short bowel syndrome is not anatomically defined. The generally accepted functional defi-nition of short bowel syndrome implies malab-sorption of nutrients, fluids, and/or electrolytes in the presence of a shortened small intestine. Massive small bowel resection most often oc-curs in the neonatal period. The ileum and the colon are the most frequently resected; howe-ver, varying degrees of jejunal removal occur as well. The remaining small bowel begins to adapt almost immediately. The length of remai-ning bowel correlates poorly with the develop-ment of malabsorptive diarrhea. The remaining length of intestine, therefore, cannot be relied upon solely for determining prognosis, as man