Otis Boykin. An ink drawing of Otis Boykin from a U.S. DEPARTMENT of Energy biographical sketch of 1979. Otis Bobby Boykin (August 29, 1920, Dallas, Texas â March 13, 1982, Chicago, Illinois) was an American inventor and engineer.
Without any fluids (either as sips, ice chips or intravenously) people with a complete bowel obstruction most often survive a week or two. Sometimes itâs only a few days, sometimes as long as three weeks. With fluids, survival time may be extended by a few weeks or even a month or two. With a bowel obstruction, things may go better than expected, but itâs important to prepare for sudden, unexpected changes.
These people have a digestive transit time of 18 hours or less. This means that what's left of the food they just ate will be excreted as a bowel movement about 18 hours later. In Westernized cultures, a transit time twice as long (36 hours) is the rule, and 48 to 72 hours is not uncommon.