Re: bowel trouble

From: Robin (rmasse2333@aol.com)
Sun Nov 5 07:28:45 2000


Dear Kate, I am so sorry to hear of all your problems. My problem is, they have done everything else to help me & nothing has worked. The only hope for me to have a life is to have surgery. Of course, there are no guarentees. But, the surgeon needs to be a specialist. I have had adhesions cut down 3 times already. This will make my 4th. I have had every test there is & have gone to 3 different pain clinics & 2 different physical therapy places. I have tried every thing there is, I dont have another option at this time. I dont like having surgery, but it is my only hope right now, but who knows what will come up in the next 5-10 years, but I cant live like this until they come up with something else. Best wishes to you Robin

At Sat, 4 Nov 2000, Kate Murphy wrote: >
>On 3 Nov 2000, at 21:58, Verna Cohen wrote:
>
>...and
>> for what? Just to be told we will not do surgery on you JUST for pain.
>> They used those words.
>>
>> I realize that we have to be very careful about the surgeons we choose
>> to deal with. We need to make sure that they know what they are doing
>> with adhesions. But, like you, I can't, by no stretch of the
>> imagination, afford to go to Drs. R & R, or Dr. Korell.
>
>Dear friends,
>
>I have been following the list for about a week or so. I am a cancer
>survivor who has had three abdominal surgeries for cancer and
>three for adhesions since my last cancer surgery. I also had
>significant lysis of adhesions during that cancer surgery. Since the
>dilated bowel in the CT-scans and barium enema masquerades as
>tumor recurrence, surgery is often the only route to rule out cancer.
>
>In both of the last two surgeries, I have had material put into the site
>to reduce adhesion formation -- both times pain has returned, the
>first time resulting in complete bowel obstruction.
>
>My surgeon and I feel that the more surgery, the more scar tissue.
>I wonder what non-surgical alternatives there are. By the way, both
>surgeons have completely ruled out laparoscopic surgery due to the
>extent of adhesion, scar tissue, and bowel obstruction.
>
>My surgeon has just started me on three times a day Advil to reduce
>inflammation and I am eating a much lower residue diet. This
>seems to have reduced pain quite a bit over the past couple of
>weeks.
>
>I do understand how debilitating pain is -- I have been pretty much
>housebound over the past nine months awaiting one surgery and
>then the second, emergency surgery for obstruction. The incision
>in that case became infected and I have been waiting for it to heal
>for nearly three months.
>
>So, I don't think surgery is the cure-all for this very difficult disease
>and hope that you have some other tips.
>
>Kate
>
>--
>Kate Murphy
>katemm@mindspring.com
>


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