Give it a few hours.
For some reason, I was expecting something to happen more quickly. There’s a little rumbling going on but that’s it so far.
BTW, the taste wasn’t awful, but wasn’t great either. It was reminescent of cough syrup, but unlike cough syrup you dilute it with water to make up 16 ounces, then drink two more 16 ounce glasses of water.
OK, so it took about one hour to work.
It’s a lot like having a bad GI bug, except you don’t actually feel unwell (other than the obvious intended effect).
Incidentally, you have to be on clear liquids for 30 hours before the procedure (e.g. soda, apple juice, sports drinks, black coffee), but nothing that’s red or purple. You’re also allowed to have fat-free chicken broth and jello. The chicken broth has probably been the best so far for satisfying hunger pangs.
Every time I think it’s slowing down, it starts up again. Overall, though, it’s not nearly as bad (so far) as I was anticipating.
Yeah, my prep time at home was about four hours in the morning, then off to the hospital and home by evening. My thread on the experience as well as others’ threads can be found in a Search. But I had mine done in Bangkok, so the specifics may differ from the US.
EDIT: Oops! I see I posted essentially the same thing farther above. Sorry for the double post.
Cologuard can detect cancer before there are polyps.
Also, I’ll add another thing I didn’t have to deal with, because I chose Cologuard: a torn colon, which can lead to a colostomy. Also death.
Who’s the poster here who was totally out of commission for several months due to a perforated colon in a colonoscopy (although he had other medical issues)?
I do remember one woman who chose to pay an extra $200 out of pocket to have it done at the hospital rather than their free-standing surgicenter, when the warning said it had a 1-in-1,000 chance of perforating her colon. In the end, she was fine in every way.
There’s a virtual colonoscopy, which is basically an MRI of the lower abdomen; I heard that Obama had one while he was POTUS. That sure sounds appealing, doesn’t it? Yeah, well, you still have to do the prep, and if they find something in the scan, they have to sedate the patient and do a scope, so there’s really very little advantage from that perspective.
Napier upthread reported that they tore his colon and gave him peritonitis in a colonoscopy (which is just what I don’t want to hear this morning). Not sure about any other medical issues he might have had (if any).
I could have had mine either in a hospital or an endoscopy clinic. My doctor’s practice only does them at the hospital one day a week, mainly for patients who have other medical issues.
I went with the endoscopy clinic on the advice of my wife (an RN), mainly because that’s where they do them most often and where they are most familiar with all of the equipment and personnel. I also would have had to wait even longer to get it done in a hospital setting (and I already had to wait for nearly 8 weeks after my initial appointment to get it done at a clinic…and that was at a clinic that wasn’t even the closest one to my house).
ETA: Time for round 2 of the prep…
Second round is down…now drinking the required water chasers. The SuPrep is grape flavored, BTW.
It’s now been a little over 24 hours since I had any solid food. I don’t feel all that bad, actually.
The prep took about an hour last night to take effect. I then spent about an hour in the bathroom. I had to return a few times after that over the next couple of hours as the effects tapered off. I then slept through the night with no issues.
The second round seems to have pretty much tapered off. I also just finished my last diluted Gatorade. Now NPO (nothing by mouth, including water) until the procedure, which will be in about 4 hours.
I’m guessing robby has gotten it over with by now, but what the hell - here’s mine.
The doctor provided me with a scrip for a powder to be mixed with water and consumed the day before the procedure after tapering off of food for another day or so before that. Like everyone else’s experience, it was diarrhea without all the other signs of illness that usually go along with it. NPO once the fluid intake stage commenced, went into the hospital the morning of with the cleanest guts in all of Stockholm.
Here’s where my experience branches off: Didn’t get knocked out, didn’t even take any pain relievers. I went in wide awake and took in the whole show.
Perhaps YMMV but I’ve had worse bouts of gas than that procedure. I mean, yeah, there definitely was some discomfort, but it was of the very mild variety and not very long in duration. They found one polyp that they immediately identified as benign, and removed it with a cauterizing loop kind of thing that only produced a minor twinge.
Best part of it was, I got to watch the whole thing on the ColoCam™! Was pretty cool seeing my insides like that. I can also state, contrary to assertions from some of my more conservatively politically aligned opponents here on the SDMB, that 1) my head is most certainly not lodged up there; and 2) I am not full of shit. So neener.
Best part, Part 2: once they’d fired up the cam and greased me up proper for the procedure, there was a moment where I beheld the glory of mine own chocolate starfish. Coincidentally enough, the hospital had what they thought was my name on the screen — which was actually my middle name and my last name. As my middle name is my father’s first name, it produced a wonderful conjunction of image and text that I could not help commenting upon: “Well what do you know, truth in advertising.”
Here’s hoping you come out of it with good news, robby.
Good luck!! Sorry yours is so late in the day (well, I don’t know what time zone you’re in, but your posting showed up at 11 AM here which means 3 PM - maybe you’re in California…).
I don’t know what advantages there might be to having it in a hospital setting - beyond immediate access to emergency stuff in case of a severe side effect. Mine are at the doc’s endoscopy clinic and I think are much more efficient as a result. My friend’s was at a hospital near her house, and she was in a much bigger recovery area, and I think the intake was longer (I could be wrong). Certainly I was waiting in a much larger waiting area. I wasn’t allowed to go back with her for the IV etc. stuff (I had done so when with her for other procedures). On the other hand, nobody goes back with me at the endo clinic, but the cubicles there are a LOT smaller and also they zip you in and out in a hurry since they’re only concentrating on one small set of procedures.
Olentzero: sounds like sedation is not the norm in Sweden - could you have had it if you’d requested? I’m wondering in general if the US is more sedation-prone for this than other countries. Being able to drive yourself afterward would be a feature, I guess - on the other hand, that brief 5 seconds of “wheeeeee” at the beginning, and the slow relaxed awakening after are also a feature :).
As a side note on sedation, there’s some controversy going on here on whether such sedation (using Propofol) really requires an MD anesthesiologist or can be safely done by a nurse anesthetist (or even just a nurs). Insurance would like it to be done by a nurse, the docs want to do it themselves. Propofol in particular is supposed to be quite safe when used correctly, I don’t know if the monitoring is different for Versed and the like.
No, this was someone else. IIRC, he had the name “David” in his username, and he has a thread about it with several hundred posts.
It’s normally the sedative of choice for scope jobs.
I came out of it feeling Gooooooood and thought I had my act together - not true.
I was off kilter for hours and it was great. My brother has the same sort of reaction.
I had this (it was actually a CAT scan) because I didn’t have anyone to drive me, so they weren’t willing to sedate me. And the tech was able to do a more general body scan–turns out I have gall stones (which have never caused a problem) and “mild atherosclerosis”.
Well, yes and no. CAT scans aren’t all that fun, although luckily it wasn’t a full body unit. Also, in order to get a good view, they have to pump air in to inflate your colon. And your colon doesn’t like being stretched, so the were two periods, about a minute each, which were quite painful. And the rest of the time you are lying there connected to the air hose, fully awake, which isn’t too dignified…
Yes, and as far as I know the prep is identical.
Luckily they didn’t have to do any follow-up work, and I wondered if they did how they would have handled it, given that they weren’t willing to sedate me in the first place. As it was, immediately afterward I was able to wobble out of the treatment room and make my way home.
…and it’s done.
They found and removed four polyps (one 6 mm, one 5 mm, and two 3 mm), which were sent out to be tested. I think the doctor said that two of them looked pre-cancerous. Depending on the pathology report, I can expect a repeat colonoscopy in 3 to 5 years.
The procedure itself was a breeze. The clinic was set up like an assembly line. I arrived and changed into a hospital gown. Got an IV in my arm. Talked to the pre-procedure nurse and the anesthesiologist, who told me I’d be getting propofol. Signed a consent form. Lay on the hospital bed for about a half hour. Wheeled into the procedure room. Greeted my GI doctor and signed another consent form. Given supplemental oxygen via nasal cannula. The nurse anesthetist marked the time at 3:15 p.m. Was then asked to roll onto my left side, and they put some kind of plastic spacer in my mouth to help with the endoscopy. I spent the next few seconds trying to decide if the mouth spacer was uncomfortable or not…
…when I realized I was back in the recovery room lying on my back. There was no sense of falling asleep, or waking up for that matter. I felt fine, other than feeling a bit dehydrated. It was now 4:09 p.m. They gave me some apple juice and crackers. Both doctors came in and spoke with me (anesthesiologist and GI physician). I found out about the polyps then. After about 10 more minutes, I got dressed and left. (My son drove me home.)
Overall, I’d say the prep was worse than the procedure, and even the prep wasn’t actually that bad. I’m really glad I got the procedure now instead of procrastinating like I usually do. And hopefully the pathology results are favorable (i.e. benign).
After seeing the results, I’m glad you had it done too. Let us know the follow-up results.
Thanks! 
No, I’m in Connecticut, and my procedure was scheduled for 3 p.m., with an arrival time of 2:15 p.m. Everyone (including my wife and my boss) told me I’d regret having the procedure in the afternoon, but it was actually fine. With the SuPrep regimen, you have to take the second dose of the prep 5-6 hours before the procedure, so if your procedure is first thing in the morning, you have to drink the prep in the middle of the night and deal with the results then. By having the procedure in the afternoon, my second dose was taken at 9:00 a.m.
Yeah, it is a strangle dynamic, the super fast loss and equally fast regaining of consciousness. I noted that on my first one 5 years ago. On my second one 6 months ago or so, I was curious and tried to pay more careful attention of how fast the the loss of consciousness was: I just noticed that my vision seemed to get black & white and then very “pixel-ated” then “snowy” ( like an old tv with no antenna reception ), with the actual time elapsed being less than 2 seconds. Then it was lights-out.