The next post will hopefully have details. For some reason, I am having trouble making this post work.
For some reason, I can’t post anything very long. The moment I try, it times out.
so I’ll try again from home tonight.
Oh, great, and leave us hanging with this thread title…
If he doesn’t return to this thread by tomorrow, should we call a posse to go look for him?
Well, at least it was only a scare, right? So he should be okay.
We, on the other hand, could suffer from the suspense…
Not even if you write it out in Word* or notepad, then copy/paste?
*Comes with the added bonus of spell check.
Oh, my God, he’s got postpox virus. I hope it’s not
Wednesday morning, I’m supposed to leave on a business trip. It’s early morning - still dark out. Mrs. Bricker wakes me up - not on purpose. But she’s clutching her abdomen and groaning. We think it’s gas. But Tums don’t do a thing. Pain gets worse.
So we hie ourselves over to the Urgent Care clinic. They take a history, and tell her she needs to go to the ER. NOW.
So we go to the nearest ER. She’s in real pain now. They ask her to rate her pain from 1-10, with 10 being the worst she’s ever felt. This is an 8. Based on the location of the pain, they immediately think, “Gall stone.” This theory is given legs when her blood tests come back: liver enzymes are high. Very high. So they give her an IV and a shot of Dilaudid. Now she feels fine. A bit disconnected, but no more pain.
But – an ultrasound reveals no stone. Curiously, it does seem to indicate that her biliary duct is constricted. So they do a radiology test, injecting some substance to see how quickly it leaves the liver. It doesn’t. Still no sign of an actual stone, though, just these narrow ducts.
So it’s off to the MRI. MRI doesn’t find a stone. MRI confirms the abnormally narrow ducts. Liver enzymes are beginning to come down slightly, but still very high.
The ER doc says it might be a rare condition called Primary Scerlosing Cholangitis. This is something he’s only seen once in all his years - very unusual, especially in someone as young as she is. He wants to admit her, because she needs a series of tests and they are difficult (impossible) to schedule as an outpatient. She needs regular checks on the liver enzymes, and she needs endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography to confirm the PSC diagnosis. This test takes time to set up - they need a GI expert, a anathesiologist, and an OR.
So she stays overnight into Thursday. I go home and read up on this PSC thing. Imagine my joy when it says that it can lead to liver failure. And then I see the thread about Padeye… who had liver failure. Now my worries and imagination are ramped up tenfold.
So - sleepless night filled with prayer.
Thursday they run blood tests through the day. They can’t make the ERCP happen that day. Mrs. Bricker gets irate. She feels fine, wants to leave. She has things to do. She can’t even crochet or knit because of the placement of the IV in the crook of her arm. She’s reduced to watching soap operas and reading. The GI doc comes in and makes it worse by being a condescending prick about the need to stay. She insists she’s going to leave, AMA if necessary. Finally our family doctor stops by and talks her into staying one more night.
She still is allowed nothing to eat or drink. Since Tuesday’s dinner, she’s had zip. No food, no water. She gets ice chips and saline via the IV to prevent dehydration. And of course Red Lobster is running commercials every two seconds with succulent juicy shrimp bouncing around. She announces that when we leave, she’s going to Red Lobster and eat shrimp. By force, if necessary.
So now it’s Friday. The ERCP is supposed to be done first thing in the morning. But one of the GI guys isn’t here. That means the other one has to do all his procedures AND those of the missing guy. Fortunately for us, the absent guy is the asshole. The new GI guy is very pleasant, and so Mrs. Bricker accepts the necessity of waiting until 4:00 PM for the ERCP.
So they start her on Levaquin via IV because this ERCP test involves running tubes inside her, and the risk of infection is not negligble. And 4 becomes 5, and 5 becomes 5:30, but finally transport arrives to take her down for the test.
They bring her back at 7. The nice GI doc says that his preliminary finding is that there is NO EVIDENCE of primary sclerosing cholangitis. Her bile ducts are smaller than normal, but not so small he felt it necessary to put in any stents or cut anything, which he had the option of doing when he was in there. He believes that the entire episode was a gallstone that was passed, and the fact that her ducts were simply smaller than average to begin with.
So – at 10, they discharge her. She’s not quite able to hit Red Lobster that night; she has to ease back into eating.
Monday we went for a follow-up visit. The liver enzymes are back down near normal. They want her on something called ursodiol, a liver bile salt that replaces some of the more toxic liver bile salts. So if bile is retained in the liver for some reason in the future, there is less liver damage.
More follow-ups to … er… follow.
But it looks like there’s not going to be anything wrong, long-term.
I never want to go through that again. And I bet she doesn’t, either.
Glad to hear she’s better. GI pain is not fun and when it’s really bad it can feel like you are having a heart attack.
I had 10 years of GI attacks 6-8 of which landed me in the ER. The ultrasounds always came up negative until November 2004 when I told the doctor he BETTER do something about it.
I had my gall baldder out and the doctor told me the reason they couldn’t see any stones on the ultrasound was because my entire gall bladder was one big lump of concrete ( the doctor’s description, not mine). I’m going on 13 months without so much as a twinge. Well, I had a stomach ache back in July and I laughed! THIS is what people complain about?!?!? It is to laugh. Hell It wasn’t even worth getting out of bed for, I just went back to sleep, no way that would have happened with the GB attacks.
PHEW! Glad to hear it was more of an episode than a chronic scary-sounding condition.
Here’s to best wishes for a speedy return to Red Lobster for Mrs. B.
Glad to have the happy ending Rick. I suggest the all you can eat shrimp basket for Mrs. B.
Bon appetite! (however you spell it) 
Great news! I’m so glad all is better.
…mmm…shrimp…
Glad everything looks ok now. That was actually better to read as a serial than one long post after all!
Oh, and the Red Lobster? About 4 years ago, it became my turn to swell like a pufferfish when I ate shrimp. Dad and my sister both develeoped it at about the same age.
So, tell your wife to have a couple shrimps for me, ok? 
Good to hear Mrs. Bricker is ok. So, she going after the shrimp and crab legs?
The gall of some people…scaring you like that. Glad to hear everything is fine. Try the scampi.
I’m happy to read the good news that the Mrs. is better.
Back in '93, my gall bladder started killing me, but when they did the ultrasound, no stones showed up. Happily, the doc decided to get rid of the thing anyway. There were no stones in it, but the official diagnosis was that it was “chronically inflamed”. Maybe I did indeed have stones at some point but passed them, like Mrs. Bricker. All I know is, all pain and trouble vanished with my gall bladder and have not returned. In case Mrs. Bricker does eventually have to jettison the offending organ, it’s really a snap laprascopic (sp?) surgery nowadays.