You have to be your own advocate.
Started having extreme pain in my abdomen last July. I'm 66 at the time.
Went to the Dr. got an upper and lower endo. Found small intestine pink and inflamed and a 2mm ulcer in duodenum.
Treated for ulcer, cured, pain getting more intense. Had to fight with Dr. about it, he finally told me the ulcer would not give me pain. I accepted that and told him I came for pain - not an ulcer.
After pushing him, tests made, lots of tests. Found chronic pancreatitis.
After blowing the call for so long, it has advanced, so now I have surgery scheduled May 8.
Remove gall bladder, inflamed portion of pancreas (only portions I hope) and sew directly to small intestine where duodenum used to be.
Hopefully, this will cure me and I can live life normally - after an extensive healing period.
I can't express my disappointment that the Dr. phoned it in when I was in better shape and my pancreas was less inflamed.
Protect your health.

Snapping, that is very good advice.

quote:

Originally posted by Snapping Twig:
You have to be your own advocate.

This is so true. The days of Marcus Welby, M.D. (as in the 70's TV show where he treated every patient as his only one) are over. Today, in most cases, Dr's jockey so many patients it's impossible for that level of care. I've been fortunate with a few specialist (cardio, hematologist etc) that actually know my name and gave me their personal cell phone number they respond to 24/7. But you need to know what you need and push the agenda.

Glad you’re on the mend. It could have been more serious, thank God it wasn’t.

Congrats, you're in a select club now. Dr. Peter Attia tells the story of a professor asking the class "what is the most common presentation of a heart attack. Lots of answers from chest/arm pain, sweating, etc. etc. The correct answer of course is..sudden death.

I consider myself much healthier than I was 5-6 years ago but my zone 2 efforts have fallen off a cliff.

I wish you a quick recovery. Damn, life getting shorter by the day. I still feel like I have full roll of toilet paper, well, maybe half a roll.

All those TLAs went right over my head but I understood enough from "hear attack." I'm glad you made it through.

Glad to hear you went in. So many guys want to ignore it and that can be a fatal mistake.

A week ago today, I had to go in to the hospital for a Kidney stone that was causing acute renal failure.

Better safe than sorry!