hi everyone i’m new i have chronic pancreatitis i have had this for 4 yrs now my doctors do not know why or how this is a severe case with many flair upsnow my gallbladder is not working i have heard good and bad things about removal after surgery can any one help thanks
Hello,
I had my Gallbladder removed in 2006, during an open surgery for a pseudocyst ( cystogastrostomy ).
I have noticed NO difference in my pancreatitis symptoms. I had never even had gallbladder troubles, but when the surgeon opened me up, he seen that my GB was scarred from pancreatitis attacks.
Now, I have heard of people who have more troubles, or no relief of symptoms, after GB removal.
Best of luck, and nice to meet you!
Cindy
I had my GB removed prior to even knowing I had CP. Some symptoms went away and it was a good thing I had it removed. My GB was not working at all and causing a tremendous amount of pain. If they think the gallbladder has to come out, it won’t hurt to have it done. I see you take a tremendous amount of enzymes. While they are quite harmless, more is not necessarily better. My pancreatic specialist freaked when he heard how much I was taking (15 a day of Creon 20). Again, it is not absorbed like other drugs so there are no real side effects but there is a max amount of Lipase that one can take (I believe it is 100,000 but I can double check that). Anything more than that and there is no real added benefit, per my specialist. Even the pharmacists I work with felt 5 Creon 20 was excessive. I hope you have a good pancreatic specialist following you and maybe a good pain management specialist. I am in the process of getting a pain specialist as the pancreatic specialist does not want to prescribe chronic pain meds (“because that is not what I do”). Many CP patients are on much more pain meds than me so I feel real lucky. I also have had several celiac plexus blocks which have helped tremendously, but only short term.
Welcome to the site and we hope we can help.
Teresa
Hi Mike,
Welcome to Care Place. You came to the right place because when you need help everyone will come forward and help you. This is one of the best example of a good support group.
I think if the doctors have found out that gall bladder is the main problem then you are lucky. They can remove through laproscopic way or through a surgery. Mostly if it is removal of gallbladder they do the Laproscopic way. In my case until the last minute the tests did not show up anything wrong with gall bladder. If it had shown earlier they could’ve removed very early and maybe I never would have ended up as an Idiopathic Chronic Pancreatitis patient. I had Peustow procedure in '00 yr. This is a procedure where they they open up the Pancreatic duct and sew it to the smaller intestines. Before this major surgery the Pancreatic specialist tried to remove lot of stones from the Pancreas.
He wasn’t expecting any stones and was going to do the normal ERCP. But once he entered he saw so many stones he started removing them and continued it until 2 to 3 hrs. He thought he took out all the stones unfortunately he didn’t and I had a major attack and he transferred the case to the surgeons. When the surgeon opened up to do the surgery to her surprise she found the gallbladder totally damaged and full of stones. So, she took that away too. Just before the surgery they did all the tests and the gallbladder didn’t show any signs of damage. Isn’t that scary? I thought I’m the only one who had that kind of experience. But after coming here I found out that there are few people who went through such experience.
So, do not worry if they want to remove the gall bladder, everything is going to be alright. Lot of people get their gallbladders out every year for different reasons and they are all doing well. I hope you are not in lot of pain and I wish you have more and more good days than the bad days. Keep up the positive attitude and it will take care of everything.
Lots of love and hugs,
Durga.
When the symptoms first presented themselves to me the doctors thought that it might be my gallbladder. They did countless x-rays which showed absolutely nothing. Luckily my primary doc thought that it was still the gallbladder so he ordered a hyda-scan. The results were no stones but it had completely stopped working. They removed it, I felt no relief but thought that it was still a wise decision. The doctors explained it to me as the fluid was still in there but wouldn’t release any of it. I immediately thought about stagnant fluid, it is a breeding ground for bacteria and can cause all kinds of infections that can lead to septic shock if left untreated long enough. I don’t want to scare you, the above infection would be a severe case and most likely wouldn’t happen. I agree with some of the other comments left on here, it couldn’t hurt and if the doctors are saying that it should come out, I’d listen to them. I hope that you can find relief soon.
hugs, prayers, and good thoughts,
Lindia
Hi Mike,
Both my daughter and husband have hereditary CP. They both have had their gallbladders removed-mostly for preventative measures. My husband had his done laproscopically and had a terrible attack immediately afterward. My daughter had the old fashioned surgery and no attack after. We learned the lesson the hard way on which surgery to go-when it is done lap-air is forced into the area which inflammed the pancreas for my husband, so that’s why for my daughter it was done the other way. He was 40 when his was removed and she was only 15. As I said this was done to prevent and lessen further attacks. It seemed to help for him but it didn’t matter for her. She has since had the Puestow surgery and still has daily pain. Not as bad but after so many years of attacks, there is alot of scarring.
Please think about the surgery carefully-if there is nothing wrong with the GB and they are just doing it for good measure, think twice about it.
Take care,
Terri