Usually viral and self-limiting. The risk is dehydration, not the infection itself.
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Gastroenteritis is infection of the gut causing vomiting, diarrhoea and cramping. It is unpleasant, it is extremely common, and the great majority settles by itself within a few days with fluids alone.
Three things are worth knowing.
1. Dehydration is the risk, not the infection. Oral rehydration salts are considerably better than water alone — glucose and sodium together drive absorption across the gut wall, which plain water cannot do.
2. Alcohol hand gel does not kill norovirus. This is why outbreaks tear through households, schools and care homes that thought they were being careful. Soap and water, thoroughly, is what works, along with a bleach-based cleaner on surfaces.
3. There is one situation where treatment does harm. In a child with bloody diarrhoea, antibiotics and anti-diarrhoeal medicines increase the risk of a serious kidney complication if the cause is E. coli O157. Bloody diarrhoea in a child should be assessed, not treated at home.
And the practical rule that stops it spreading: stay off work, school or nursery until 48 hours after the last episode of vomiting or diarrhoea. For food handlers and healthcare staff that is a requirement, not a courtesy.
Genuinely useful for working out the source:
Babies and young children, frail older adults, pregnant women, anyone immunosuppressed, and people with inflammatory bowel disease. People taking a proton pump inhibitor are also more susceptible, since stomach acid is a defence.
Straightforward gastroenteritis needs no test. Assessment is about identifying who is dehydrated, who has something else, and who needs a stool sample.
Certain infections are notifiable to public health, which is part of how outbreaks are stopped — it is a public health measure, not a mark against anyone.
We cannot assess dehydration properly by video, particularly in a child. A drowsy child, a baby not feeding, or anyone unable to keep fluids down needs seeing the same day — and we will say so rather than arranging a test.
Eat when you feel able. The old advice to starve for 24 hours is outdated — food helps the gut lining recover, and children in particular should return to a normal diet as soon as they will take it. No need for a bland or restricted diet.
Do not give antibiotics or anti-diarrhoeal medicine to a child with bloody diarrhoea. If the cause is E. coli O157, both increase the risk of haemolytic uraemic syndrome — a serious kidney complication. This needs assessment, not treatment at home.
Go to A&E or call 999 for:
Seek same-day medical advice for:
Book an appointment for:
Alcohol gel does not kill norovirus. Soap and water, for a full twenty seconds, including thumbs and between the fingers — after the toilet, after changing nappies, before preparing food, and before eating. This is the single most effective measure available, and gel gives false confidence.
Stay off work, school or nursery until 48 hours after the last episode. For food handlers and healthcare staff this is a formal requirement, and we can provide a sick note. For everyone else it is what prevents the second and third wave through a workplace.
Avoid swimming pools for two weeks after diarrhoea — and strictly so after cryptosporidium, which survives chlorination.
The rotavirus vaccine is part of the routine infant schedule and has substantially reduced severe gastroenteritis in babies. Worth taking up.
Gastroenteritis needs fluids, not medicine, and the fluids cost a few pounds. Oral rehydration salts from any pharmacy are the treatment, and they matter far more than anything a doctor prescribes — dehydration is what causes harm, particularly in young children and older people.
Your NHS GP treats it free, and NHS 111 is the right route for advice out of hours.
Antibiotics are usually wrong — most gastroenteritis is viral, and antibiotics can prolong carriage of some bacteria. Loperamide helps symptoms in adults but should be avoided where there is fever or blood in the stool, and is not recommended for children.
The advice that costs nothing and prevents spread: alcohol gel does not kill norovirus — soap and water hand washing is what works, which surprises people. Stay off work or school until 48 hours after the last episode of vomiting or diarrhoea, and longer for food handlers and healthcare workers.
Where a private consultation is genuinely useful is assessing dehydration, particularly in a child or an older person, and deciding whether this needs to be seen — and identifying when it is not gastroenteritis at all.
What needs urgent assessment: signs of dehydration — reduced urine, dizziness on standing, drowsiness; blood in the stool; severe or localised abdominal pain; symptoms beyond a week; or recent travel with persistent diarrhoea. Vomiting with severe abdominal pain and no diarrhoea is not gastroenteritis until proven otherwise.
NICE Clinical Knowledge Summary, Gastroenteritis, is the principal reference for adults, and NICE CG84, Diarrhoea and vomiting in children under 5, for young children. Both establish oral rehydration as the mainstay of management.
CG84 sets out clinical features of dehydration and shock, and recommends oral rehydration solution rather than fruit juices or carbonated drinks.
CKS advises against routine antibiotics, reserving them for specific pathogens or vulnerable patients, and against antimotility agents in bloody diarrhoea or where fever is present.
CKS recommends stool sampling where there is blood, recent antibiotic or hospital exposure, recent travel, immunosuppression, or symptoms persisting beyond a week.
UK Health Security Agency guidance sets the 48-hour exclusion period and notes that alcohol-based hand gels are not effective against norovirus, requiring soap and water — the basis for the point above.
Oral rehydration salts, in small amounts frequently. They work considerably better than water because the glucose and sodium together pull water across the gut wall. A few sips every few minutes; a large glass will come straight back. Avoid fizzy drinks, undiluted juice and sports drinks — all too sugary, and they make diarrhoea worse.
Because alcohol gel does not kill norovirus. Soap and water for a full twenty seconds is what works, together with a bleach-based cleaner on taps, handles and the toilet — and flushing with the lid down, since vomiting and flushing both aerosolise the virus.
No — that advice is outdated. Eat when you feel able, and return to a normal diet as soon as you can; food helps the gut lining recover. This matters particularly for children, who should not be kept on a restricted diet. Keep breastfeeding a baby throughout, more often and for shorter periods.
Adults can use loperamide for ordinary watery diarrhoea if you have a day to get through. Not if there is blood in the stool, not with a high fever, not after antibiotics, and not in young children. Slowing the bowel when the infection is invading the gut wall causes more problems than it solves.
Get them assessed — and do not give antibiotics or anti-diarrhoeal medicine. If the cause is E. coli O157, both increase the risk of haemolytic uraemic syndrome, a serious kidney complication. This is one of the few situations in this whole area where treatment does harm.
48 hours after the last episode of vomiting or diarrhoea. For food handlers and healthcare workers that is a requirement rather than advice. And stay out of swimming pools for two weeks after diarrhoea, especially after cryptosporidium, which survives chlorine.
Almost certainly not. Most gastroenteritis is viral, and most bacterial cases settle by themselves. Antibiotics can prolong salmonella carriage, raise the risk of C. difficile, and in E. coli O157 make things considerably worse.
Fairly common, yes. Temporary lactose intolerance after gastroenteritis settles over weeks, and post-infectious IBS is a recognised outcome that usually improves over months. But anything persisting beyond two weeks should be tested rather than waited out — giardia, coeliac disease and inflammatory bowel disease all get missed this way.
August 23, 2026
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20 minutes
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£40 for 20 minutes
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Same-day access is usually available, from 6am to 10pm, seven days a week. You choose a time that suits you rather than waiting on hold at 8am.
Yes. Care is led personally by Dr Mohammad Khan, so you are not passed between clinicians. Continuity is the point of a small practice: someone who knows your history and is listening attentively rather than working through a checklist.
Yes, with your consent. We can access your Summary Care Record during the consultation, so your current medications, allergies and significant history are in the room. That means fewer questions you have already answered elsewhere, and safer prescribing.
No. We are not here to replace GPs, only to support them. Your NHS practice remains responsible for your ongoing care, and with your consent we write to them after the consultation. We are useful when you need to be seen sooner, or want more time than a standard appointment allows.
Twenty unhurried minutes and a comprehensive assessment. A written treatment plan is included, along with any prescription, sick note or referral letter arising from the consultation, at no extra charge.
£40 for 20 minutes, self-pay. Membership is optional and never required. Priced for fairness, because we are not here to charge extortionate amounts for access to a doctor.
It means the diagnosis can usually be made from your history and photographs, and that treatment can be arranged safely without examining you. Where a condition is not marked treatable online, it is because examination is the diagnosis — listening to a chest, feeling an abdomen, examining an ear or a joint — or because a procedure or device is needed.
Yes, where there is a genuine bacterial infection — cellulitis, impetigo, bacterial urine infections, confirmed strep throat. We will also frequently tell you that you do not need one. Most sore throats, coughs, colds and earaches are viral, and an antibiotic gives you the side effects with none of the benefit.
If your problem turns out to be genuinely outside what we can do remotely, the doctor will tell you straight away, point you to the right service, and refund your fee in full. We would rather do that than fill twenty minutes to justify the charge.
Call 999 or go to A&E — do not book an online appointment and do not wait for a reply to an email. For urgent problems that are not emergencies, NHS 111 is available 24 hours a day, online or by phone, and can direct you to the right service.
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