Gallbladder Attack with no Gallbladder!

[Cheyne]

So I had my gallbladder removed about 4 months ago. I had horrible pain up in my chest that shot through to my back. I returned to the hospital a month later with the same pain where they performed an ERCP. My pain has still not gone away! Last Wednesday they did an endoscopy and found nothing, and did another ERCP 3 days ago where they snipped the sphincter muscle to reduce spasms. I ended up in the ER last night where they blew me off and send me home with acid reducer pills. Has anyone had the same problem? Is there any hope? Should I be looking in a different direction?

[CalGal]

Cheyne, you need to seek help from a doc who deals with post-GB issues - and there don't seem to be a heck of a lot of docs that understand the problem unfortunately.

When they did the ERCP, was manometry a component of the procedure? If you don't know, find out, and also find out what the pressures were if manometry was done. The condition you're descrbing sounds like SOD, sphincter of Oddi dysfunction, and it's a condition that needs to be treated by someone who truly understands the problem. Here's a link that will give you a general overview of the problem: http://hopkins-gi.nts.jhu.edu/pages/latin/templates/index.cfm?pg=disease1&organ=3&disease=12&lang_id=1

This condition can impact both the common bile duct and the pancreas so it needs to be taken seriously.

The ER will only give you a brief respite, if that. You need to be working closely with your own GI doc to try to bring the problem under control. And you need to understand as much about the condition as you can so that you can seek out the best help.

[Ferraro]

I had my gall bladder out August 21st and I was fine up until yesterday.  I had pain so bad in the middle of my stomach and diaarhea last night.  I woke up with bad pain again.  I'm hoping that it was the ice cream that I ate yesterday so I'm waiting to see how the day goes today.  I feel worse with my gallbladder out.  The only thing I felt before was a soreness in my upper stomach.  I never had any pain but had it removed because they found stones.  I think we need to find a good doctor.  The hospitals throw you out right away.  I hope one of us gets answers soon.

Emiy