gall bladder disease in a teenager

[lola_anamara]

i am an 18 year old female. about 4 days ago while at a friends house i experienced a horrible pain in my side right after eating dinner (which was lasagna with lots of cheese) the pain went away after about half an hour and i went home. the next day right after i ate lunch (fried chicken on a salad with lots of cheese and ranch dressing)  i got the pain again but it still lasted only about half an hour to 45 minutes. a few hours late i was eating again (this time it was cheese its) and drinking a soda (mountain dew) and i got the pain again. this time it didn't go away after half an hour so when my roommate came home i asked her to take me to the ER. they took blood and a urine sample and put me on an IV and gave me pain meds.
this was just the worst of some symptoms that have slowly been coming on. about 3 months ago blacked out during my chemistry lab class and threw up on my teachers shoes. they suspected it was just from inhaling fumes and let me go home for the day. since then the same thing has happened roughly a dozen times all doing different things. doing laundry, cashiering at my job, watching a movie. and its always the same. first i get a really high fever, then i get dizzy then i throw up. i thought i was fine until about three weeks ago when it happened and after that i started not being able to keep any food down at all. i dropped from 135 to about 118 in 2 weeks (im 5 feet 10 inches tall) i finally went to the doctor who told me i was in danger of becoming anorexic and put me on the brat diet. and in the last week or so i have also noticed that swallowing solid foods has become difficult for me and i have this feeling in my throat that i have something stuck in there.
so after they ran the tests in the ER they said i either had a dysfunctional gall bladder or an ulcer but since the urine test and blood tests looked normal they said it was probably an ulcer. he prescribed omeprezole, vicodin for the pain and told me to stay away from spicy and greasy foods. he also said that if in 3 days the pain wasn't going away to come back. it has been 2 days since i went on the omeprezole and i feel worse. the vicodin doesn't even take the pain away anymore and i can barely walk the pain is so bad.
i am beginning to worry a lot because it is beginning to interfere with my work home and school live by preventing me from doing normal everyday things. i have had to call in sick to work alot and missed classes and cant do the chores around my apartment.
i was just wondering if i could have a dysfunctional gall bladder even if all the tests look normal or if this may be even more serious then they think

[Matthew007]

also push to see a specialist asap if you haven't already :S your weight loss isn't a good sign.

[Matthew007]

ugh that s u c k s.

well your ER room doctor was right.. but you've got good instincts on the gallbladder issue as well.

Few options.. lots of ulcers are caused by a virus called h. ploryi and a simple blood test or breath test would rule that out.  I'm guessing your ER room doctor did that but it would be good to find out.

if it's a normal ulcer, he's right.. a ulcer normally feels better somewhat...usually I think it takes longer than 3 days but i'm not the doctor..

the gallbladder sounds more likely.  Usually when you eat something heavy in fats and oils the gallbladder squeezes out bile to help digest your food.  Well if there's a stones in there that can cause problems or if your gallbladder is just sick or not working right that would make sense you felt sick after eating.  Normally with an ulcer if you eat somethign with calcium you feel much better..and then after it passes the ulcer area you feel much worse.  Gallbladder pain is never normal and each person has their own problems with it.

My guess is you'll need a possible blood test to check your liver levels and an ultrasound checking for stones.  If both are negative then you usually do a HIDA scan testing the gallbladder..usually below a certain percentage it's usually recommended to have surgery to remove it.  So yeah when I did the ultrasound and blood tests everything was normal but when I did a HIDA scan it showed like 12% working... so yeah.. unless you've done that test you haven't ruled out gallbladder issues.

So hopefully it's just an ulcer..but yeah def. could be gallbladder disease.  In the meantime follow that diet..super low in fats/oils...if it's ulcer use some tums but you're looking at more testing if you don't feel better soon :S sorry.  Try not to stress..you'll end up having panick attacks not sleeping and being a royal wreck like Matthew.