It's estimated that between 2% and 7% of all adults suffer from stool incontinence also known as faecal or bowel incontinence.
This is an exceptionally embarrassing condition for most people and as a result, many people with the condition are reluctant to talk about it even with their doctor.
The incidence of stool incontinence increases with age and it is estimated that nearly a third of all people living in nursing homes suffer from it.
It is in fact, a major reason that the elderly are admitted to the nursing homes.
While it's a difficult condition to deal with it is not impossible to manage.
A visit to your doctor is the first step along with dropping the reluctance to discuss it.
Here's a quick list of common causes:

• Stool incontinence can be caused by a number of situations.
  Surprisingly, chronic constipation can be a major cause.
  Hard stools block the colon or rectum backing up the system.
  Loose or runny stools seep around the hard stool and leak out the rectum.
  In addition, the hard stool is stretching and weakening the muscles in the rectum reducing the ability to control the movement
• Diarrhea is an obvious cause and we have all had bouts of this usually coupled with the flu or with food that didn't agree with us.
  However if the diarrhea is chronic then there is another underlying reason.
  
• Damage to the sphincter muscles can also cause this condition and most commonly occurs in women after a difficult pregnancy and child birth.
  While the damage may have occurred at the time of birth, the incontinence may not appear until several years later.
  

Stool incontinence can also be caused by nerve damage, cancers, damage occurring during surgery and simple aging where the muscles of the pelvic floor are weakened.
There are solutions to this condition and together you and your doctor can determine what's best for you.