Monday, April 14, 2014

Gallstones (Cholelith)

This is a post regarding my mother's gallstones.
WARNING:  This might look gross to others.



My mom was diagnosed with CHOLELITHIASIS.  For a few days before her hospitalization, she complained of pain after each meal.  Her self-remedy would be to induce vomiting.  At first I thought it was part of the symptoms, but she said she just did it on purpose.  She described crushing pain that radiates to the back.  At first she was diagnosed with dyspepsia but since the medications prescribed to her weren't working, the next possible suspect was gall stones.  They ordered an ultrasound and at the ultrasound, the stones were confirmed.  My mother opted for immediate cholecystectomy (gall bladder removal surgery).

My mother was confined Sunday night and she has not eaten anything the rest of the day.  By Monday or Tuesday, we were informed that her alkaline phosphatase blood work was elevated, and it was explained to us that it was an indicator of duct blockage.  A stone may have blocked the duct, and then she was ordered to undergo ERCP to visualize the ducts and the gall bladder.  My mom returned to the room still under anesthesia.  The ERCP result states no blockage was found, but the duct was dilated indicating possible passage of stone.  The next step was to finally to undergo gall bladder removal.

The nurses fetched my mom at the afternoon and she came back to the room a little before midnight.  The doctor explained that my mom's anatomy was a little different that's why it took longer than usual.  The nurses paged me to receive my mom's gall stones.  The surgeon showed me the normal-sized gall bladder and then the stones, but they only gave us the stones.




Thank you for reading.

God bless. (^_^)

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