The delightful emergency gallbladder surgery thread

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
21
  1. I started vomiting and I couldn’t stop. The nausea was constant. I went to the doctor, who told me I was having a gall bladder attack, stuck me with a needle and called the hospital to let them know I was coming. They did an MRI and found no signs of inflammation, but the doctor in the ER did another more careful test just to be sure (can’t remember what it was but I think they injected me with some dye…HIDA scan?)

An hour later they came back to me, said, “You need surgery now, please sign these consent forms.”

Turns out the reason the MRI showed no inflammation was because the tissue was shriveled, dead and infected. I also had two gallstones blocking my bile duct. He said due to the condition of my gall bladder, this had been going on for years. And he was correct. I had been in and out of gastroenterology departments and had umpteen colonoscopies to figure out what the hell was wrong, and nobody suggested my gall bladder.

I felt much better after surgery but it took a couple of months to recover. I believe I was in the hospital for two days.

In total I vomited 19 times. The pain was a 10, easily. If someone had offered me a bullet, I would have taken it.

22

I have not had mine out (family history suggests it’s coming eventually), but a friend who has had theirs out ended up adding bile salts to their diet at the recommendation of their doctor (I think - I can’t find the text conversation anymore).

I don’t remember what problem it solved for them, so basically this is a “here’s a phrase in case you have effects that you need to talk about with your doctor to see if these might help” comment.

23

Ugh!!!

I had mine out back in 2010 (started a thread about it here, at the time). Luckily, mine was not done in an emergency setting - the pain had come and gone for several days but I never had the vomiting etc. so I was able to wait until the doctor could schedule it.

The scary part, when it first flared up, was that we were snowed in at home during the first of many severe snowfalls we had that year. The worst part of the experience, aside from that worry, was that I ITCHED. Hands and feet. Nonstop itching. Didn’t sleep for 48 hours. When I told my doctor, later, that the pain wasn’t all that bad, I had to assure her “Don’t get me wrong - the pain sucked. But the ITCHING!!!”. I believe it was caused by my bile ducts being completely blocked for a bit, causing high levels of bilirubin in the blood.

No bruising. My shoulders hurt like hell later on, which I’d heard of - from the CO2 they use to inflate the gut. Things inside were obviously sore even though I didn’t realize it: a few weeks later when I was at the grocery store, I absentmindedly pushed the cart forward by bumping it with my belly. The face I made alarmed a produce clerk who happened to be looking my way and rushed over to make sure I was OK.

Oh, and you need fiber. Seriously. Lots of high-fiber foods. Between the narcotics, and your belly being rummaged in, you need fiber.

24

Might the friend have used a bile acid sequestrant? Questran (which I gather has to be mixed into water then drunk) and Welchol (which is a pill) are both in that category. The argument is, I think, that since your body no longer has a place to store bile until it’s needed, it dumps it constantly into the digestive tract - which can cause side effects.

Mainly, I gather, diarrhea: the first few weeks after my surgery, I had the occasional “clench-cheeked run-waddle”, after which things improved for quite a while.

Then about 3-4 years ago, the diarrhea became much more of a problem - to the point where I actually went to the gastro to discuss it. He suggested it might be bile acid diarrhea, for which the sequestrants are a good option (lots of people don’t tolerate them because they can cause constipation, which in my case is desirable!).

So I’m on 2 tablets of Welchol (colesevalam) every day - more if I’m going to be driving or otherwise not near a bathroom. If I miss a day… let’s just say I regret my error the next day.

You are now at a slightly increased risk of developing colon polyps / cancer - so DON’T SKIP THOSE SCREENINGS!!! Dunno if that was at play in my case - gallbladder vacated the premises in February 2010, and the scary colonoscopy results were just 5 or 6 months later. I suspect it didn’t help me any!

25

I had mine out 5 years ago. I’d had two major attacks before that where ultrasounds didn’t show anything. The third major attack happened in the middle of the night. It woke me up, and the pain was located at the base of my sternum. I was severely nauseated, but didn’t throw up.

When I got to the ER, they took me straight back because the location of the pain made it chest pain. When the blood work came back, I had elevated liver enzymes. The ultrasound showed a one cm stone stuck in the neck of the gallbladder. The stone didn’t move when they had me move into different positions. The ER doctor told me I’d probably get emergency surgery.

Then, weirdness ensued. The ultrasound report suggested that the stone would likely move out of the neck and back into the gallbladder, with only evidence to the contrary. A surgical intern told me, based on eff-all* that my elevated liver enzymes were probably from fatty liver disease, and not to do with my gallbladder. (I’d had multiple check up labs over the years with normal liver numbers.) The actual consulting surgeon told me that because I wasn’t at my insurer’s hospital, and it wasn’t an emergency, I’d have to go home and schedule surgery for probably a few weeks out.

Luckily, my spouse was there to advocate for me. I work 50 miles away from home. If I had a severe attack there, I’d be stuck there, away from my family. Also, the pain hadn’t completely gone away. And, my spouse had recently gotten her gallbladder out at the same hospital, with a letter of agreement between the hospital and the insurer. So, I was admitted, and got my gallbladder out the following afternoon.

It all went well. One hiccup was that I made a financial decision the day after, which was uncharacteristic for me. I realized later that my brain was definitely affected by the anesthesia for a few weeks after the surgery.

Oh, and my liver enzymes went back to normal very quickly after surgery.

*Well, based on my appearance, but the assumption was wrong.

26

Entirely possible - since I can’t find the convo, I’m going to assume you’re correct as the person with actual experience. :grinning:

27

Yes indeed. My wife and MIL (who was a nurse) go for a walk every morning, and this morning my wife returned, opened the front door, and shouted, “mom says you need to go buy a couple of enemas!”

There were so many things wrong with that moment.

I went and bought chewable Duralax instead, that stuff worked in like an hour. :slightly_smiling_face:

28

Did you have a fundoplication?

My SIL’s pregnancy with my oldest niece, the first half anyway, was a miserable experience. She met several of the criteria for HG but never got that dreaded diagnosis because she was not dehydrated. Shortly after the birth, she had an acute gallbladder attack, and had her GB out a few weeks later. That was not pleasant either, because her common bile duct sprung a leak and she had to get a stent, which had to be removed some time later.

Her second pregnancy was MUCH easier (she didn’t completely escape morning sickness, but she had a much milder case that time) and my dad was the first of many people who wondered if she actually had gallbladder trouble disguised as this.

p.s. Pretty much everyone in my SIL’s family has had terrible gallbladder issues, the men too, and I’ve joked that her daughters might want to get prophylactic GB removals, should any place ever offer them.

29

That’s rather terrifying :).

For me: I asked the nurse if something like Colace (stool softener) was standard prescription in the hospital. She looked baffled. It had been handed to me as a matter of course when I gave birth, years before. I had my husband buy some, and a lot of stuff like Raisin Bran. I didn’t want anything that would have caused any jet propulsion effects.

Without getting TOO graphic: my gastro agreed with me that “Farting Without Fear” would indeed be a good name for a very, very strange self-help book.

Poor thing!!

Me, I met all the F’s criteria: Female, Fair (caucasian), Forty-plus. Fecund (has been pregnant), Fat. Luckily, mine happened years after my pregnancies.

30

Pretty boring for me. A couple of episodes of mild pain over the years. Finally the doctor did an agressive gut finger probe, oooow. Laparoscopic a few days later, easy except someone didn’t read the wristband about no iodine as germ smear. (related to shellfish allergy). Two hours later, I ripped off the gauzes to raised brilliant red skin. Some regular antibiotic cream and things settled down. The gall bladder was bloated with small stones, about the size that could block the pancreatic duct. I just avoid heavy fat like real milkshakes made with real cream. The blasters that ensue are “unpleasant” for all.

31

My poor grandmother had her gallbladder attack while pregnant with her firstborn, and they wouldn’t/couldn’t operate, so she had to give birth with a wrecked gallbladder. Apparently this runs in my family because all of the women in my family (Mom’s side) have had their gallbladders removed.

32

Mr. Wrekker had his gall bladder out 10 or so years ago. It was uneventful.
He’s so damn healthy for an old guy, it’s kinda disgusting.
So he wasn’t too concerned about after effects of the laproscopic surgery.

The bellybutton incision opened up after he was home 3 days. That would have sent me over the edge. Gah!!
But he waited til his post op appointment.
He had to visit the OR again for being remiss.
Then he decided to be careful for a few weeks. He said it was very painful whatever they did to fix it.

33

Well, here’s something funny. I had my post-surgical exam today, and my surgeon’s partner (it’s a new partnership group) started looking me over with growing perplexity.

“Where are your other incisions?”
“There aren’t any.”
“There have to be, I do four incisions, but there should at least be a third.”

He keeps poking around on either side. “Well, I knew he was doing something sophisticated, so there you go.”

I found some papers from 2020 advocating for two-incision gallbladder laparoscopy like it was new-ish, but I have no idea how new.

It does perhaps explain the post-op nurse confiding to me, “I’ve noticed this guy’s patients come out of surgery in very good shape.” I was still logy from the general & didn’t follow up, but maybe that’s it.