Torturous Colon Treatment/Bowel Resection

[fox998]

Has anyone had a large bowel removed for treatment of a torturous colon accompanied by chronic constipation? Have pursued all other supplements, OTC laxatives and pharmaceuticals. GI Specialist sees no other options. If you have had the surgery, was it successful? Any long term side effects such as diarrhea?

[fox998]

Excellent. Have done as suggested and printed out your experiences for further review and discussion with the docs. Very informative. Thank you for caring enough to respond.

[fox998]

I'll be looking for a second opinion and will mention the HIDA scan and small bowel motility. Thank you for your continued thoughts, ideas on all the possible issues.

[Morecambe]

In your first posting you asked about removal of the large bowel.  Well, in 2004 I underwent a total colectomy but for a different reason - namely following episodes of torrential diverticular bleeding.  I suppose that the technique will be more or less similar for you as it was for me.  However, it is possible to perform the surgery laparoscopically in certain cases which lessens the trauma to the abdomen etc.

In reponse to nother Medhelp patient's posting, I shared my own experiences back in May 2004 on:-

http://www.medhelp.org/posts/show/523166

You may like to have a look at this summary and perhaps print it off and show it to your surgeon to check whether he/she agrees with my observations as a basis for what you could expect.

Do please come back with any questions you may have.

regards
Morecambe

[patient915]

Good, those eliminations sound like a good idea.  I hope they help.  Have you had any testing done like a sitsmarker test?

It could be possible that some of your constipation is due to a slow small intestine.  There are a couple different tests that look at this.  If this is the case, then there are different medications to try to speed up the small intestine that you probably haven't tried (like octreotide).  I am getting a HIDA scan this week to look at my small bowel motility to see if my motility has worsened causing some of my recent problems (I had this test a couple years ago and my small bowel motility wasn't too severe).

[fox998]

Thank you. Will keep your advice in mind during the surgery/no surgery decision process. Currently, do gluten free and keep dairy intake to a minimum.

[patient915]

A bowel movement every 3-5 days without medications is actually pretty good!  For the bloatedness, have you tried eliminating anything from your diet?

I also have a torturous colon, but personally believe that the surgery would cause more problems than I already have.

[fox998]

Thank you for responding!  I am able to have bowel movements but must take an incredible amount of fiber pills, powders. Also take Lactulose and Amitiza. However, in order to take the Amitiza must take a nausea pill before and after. Often times still have nausea with the Amitiza and not convinced it helps all that much. I've been at this for 8 yrs and have done everything but stand on my head. Without pills and powder - bowel movements are difficult and every 3-5 days. And only partial. EXTREMELY bloated. Have difficulty fitting into street clothes later in the day. Makes work life and social life difficult. If I have an evening presentation must do it on an empty stomach. Come home early from social functions because I have so many meds/pills to layer in.

Have you had any surgery? If so, was it successful?

[patient915]

Welcome to the gastroenterology community!  How often do you have a bowel movement?  Have you tried any of the newer treatments like amitiza?