Liver and Spleen are enlarged.. Need help understanding..

[kyanasama]

My liver and spleen are enlarged. My liver is 15.4 and shows hyperechoic areas. My spleen is also enlarged, but I am unsure of the exact size. Both are very sore all the time and I also feel back pain. I am a Type II diabetic. My hepatic panels are also elevated. I have had ultrasounds and CT scans and both show a general enlargement and no reason for my pain.

In the last week (before I knew about the exact measurements), I have had chills, nausea and bloody stools. My skin is always itchy too. My doctors have referred me to a GI and said if my stools are still bloody to go to the ER, but all the ER does is fill me up with morphine for the pain and send me home, which does nothing for me. I just don't have the energy to be doing all of this anymore. Do you have any insights that I can take to the GI for me to help quicken the diagnosis? I am all about treating what's wrong, but I want to be informed about my choices as possible.


This discussion is related to enlarged spleen all tests came back normal.

[Bosco2420]

Last Tuesday I saw the GI Doctor at Kaiser and was told that my all ready fatty liver is even bigger and now my spleen is large.  I'm going in next Tuesday for a Liver Biopsy to clarify the Doctors suspicions that I may have a genetic desease called Hemochromatosis .  Other tests will be done as well to find out if there is any damage done to the liver yet.
The reason why the Doctor suspects Hemochromatosis is because my FERRITIN levels for the past 5 years have been high.  I also have fatty liver and must start loosing weight now. I'm also anemic.

[boron]

Chills, nausea and bloody stools already went away? Do you think it could be an episode of food poisoning? The blood could also be from intestinal lymphoma (if liver and spleen disease is from lymphoma), or with unrelated inflammatory bowel disease (crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis).

Itchy skin is probably from bile salts depositing in the skin. This is due to liver disease (can't be said which exactly), where bile is not properly excreted into intestine, as it should be, but enters the blood and then the skin. You maybe also have dark urine?

Liver and spleen being enlarged at the same time is called "hepatosplenomegalia" (if you'll search). Main causes are:
- heart failure
- infection
- blood disorder, like anemia, leukemia
- lymphoma

Biopsy (sample of of those hyperechoic areas in the liver) should be made to get exact diagnosis. But I'm sure that even without that, just on the basis of blood tests (especially white blood cells) and visible changes in the liver, a doctor should tell you what he thinks it is. But biopsy is the proof.