Hi All. My first post here.
I've been suffering symptoms for several months that point to pancreas issues.
Upper centre and left right sided abdominal pain. Loose stools, weight loss but this is now stable.
I've seen my doctor and explained my concerns regarding my pancreas. Doctor says definitely not pancreatic issues but sent me for blood test and ultrasound which all came back clear.
Doctor believes I may IBS and said pancreatic issues especially with cancer do not show any symptoms and when they do the cancer is advanced, he also said that my spleen gallbladder kidneys liver bladder are all clear and that my pancreas was obscured due to gas. If pancreatic cancer was happening then it would have shown in my other organs because this type of cancer spreads very quickly and would show in my other organs.
Does anyone else have any experience of pancreas issues and what my doctor tells is correct and I'm reading too much into this.
The thing that troubles me is I am not getting any better.
Thanks
I thought I had pancreatic issues for months and it turned out I had chronic gastritis caused by h pylori. My pancreas was fine all along.
Gastritis caused me pain on the left side of my body, loose pale stools, weight loss, bloating, constipation and diarreah. If your symtoms are similar get an endoscopy and tested for h pylori.
I had same things , pain sometimes on left and sometimes on right side . I did all tests and everything came back clear. I had H pylori bacteria which caused all that pain , loose stools and bloading.
Yep I know what you mean. It's amazing how a little bacteria can affect your health so badly!
I did research gastritis and found my burning discomfort is usually worse an hour or so after eating, same as what gastritis causes.
I do take 1 omperazole daily but that does not help with the burning and discomfort but it does work with acid reflux.
12 months ago my GP did a stool sample for HPylori but that came negative. I dont know how reliable stool sample test are.
There is definitely something going on inside but my GP does not seem to concerned about it and my doc is very good and always on the ball.
Forgot to say that I have upper abdominal bloating every time I eat. Again my GP didn't seem to concerned, he did a thorough abdominal exam and said all is fine and probably IBS.
I worried about my pancreas too but it could not be seen and
was ruled out when I asked about it. My spleen, kidneys, bladder, gallbladder and liver were fine on the ultrasound. I too had gas which obscured my stomach but in my case it was bowel gas. I have pain that moves about my stomach and varies in type and intensity along with changes in bowel habit. I was diagnosed with IBS.
Try kerping a food food diary to see if anything is triggering your symptoms. Try peppermint oil capsules and ask your doctor if you could try Buscopan. I read too much into my symptoms because of googling and overthinking. Stress will make your symptoms worse and this may be why you are not getting better. If you have IBS, stress will make it worse.
H pylori stool tests are pretty accurate, however if you were on ppi when you did it this can reduce the accuracy some what.
I would be requesting an endoscopy as it sounds like you have gastritis if you have burning in your stomach.
I don't wish to sound harsh...but my experience of doctors wasn't particularly good. After numerous tests I was told that I was fine and probably had IBS, but I knew something was wrong with my stomach. I suffered for months and lost 3 stone altogether and felt really ill.
Finally, after I kept pushing, they found I had bad gastritis and h pylori. I had the triple therapy and it killed it but it took me 6 months of strict diet and ppi to heal. I'm ok now and back to normal but it took me a while to heal.
You may not have h pylori but gastritis can be caused by other things.
Get checked out to be on safe side. I had the same symptoms as you.
And in the meantime eat clean, it will greatly help your symptoms.
Yes I will keep a food diary and speak with my GP about another stool sample and if needed an endoscopy, don't fancy having an endoscopy to be honest. I am currently trying to eat clean and healthy.
Sorry to weigh in here, but the stool h.pylori test is not influenced by PPI.
(The stool h.pylori looks for the antigen, the -dead- bacteria, bacteria parts, itself - h.pylori does not live anymore when passed through guts, sensitive to bile acid-, whereas a breath test or biopsy looks for a metabolism activity -urease- or bacteria itself in the histology)
That's the beauty of the stool test and yes, it is quite sensitive, rarely has false neg results.
Since it was 12 months ago, I would ask if it could be retested by it stool or breath, but for breath test you need to be off PPI for weeks please.
(Blood and urine look for antibody, hence not good to decide on if present infection or passed)
Good luck.
Endoscopy isn't that bad. Just unpleasant rather than painful. But worth having to get a diagnosis.
If you're in UK there are private clinics who do h pylori stool samples. They aren't expensive either.
Sanya I personally spoke to a doctor who owned his own testing clinic. He stated that ppi does affect the result, it makes it 70% accurate rather than the usual 96%. He advised come off it for 14 days.
H2 blockers don't affect the result.
Shaun if you get an endoscopy they can test for h pylori then as well. But again it's best if you're off ppi for 14 days when you have this
Wow
I have never ever seen a study of a stool test h.pyl statistic
sensitivity and/or specifity dropping from 96% to 70% (but in breath tests).
Only slight drops, not significant enough to sound the alarm.
He should publish this data then if stool tests were as effected in sensitivity (specifity is mostly not) as breath tests.
Really!
It's not out there. I am a med scientist and have not come accross such a dramatic statistic re stool test and PPI.
But be aware few false negative results happen even without PPI anyway.
(The sensitivity is not 100% for any of those tests even without PPI.)
PPI have a bacteriostatic effect (not completely killing otherwise this would be treating the infection, which it doesn't obviously),
numbers are smaller;
I would anyway recommend a repeat....12 months is a long time.
Especially if symptoms persist.
And a cheer for docs, that are playing it on the save side.
That's good.
We had biopsies taken and 'neg' result under PPI and I had a real struggle to tell them, that the chances of being false negative are quite significant given the circumstances of being under PPI for biopsy urease testing and overlooking the small number of bacteria in the microscopy slide.
THAT I call really frustrating.
I will speak with my GP when he returns from holiday and ask to be tested again for HPylori infection. From reading the comments posted the stool sample test is the most reliable test, so I will go down that road.
Just curious Sanya with you being a med scientist why omperazole stop the acid reflux by taking one a day yet they don't seem to touch the pain discomfort in my upper abdomen?.
I agree, there is still a lot of confusion out there around whether you can or not take ppi before certain h pylori testing procedures.
My own personal view was I'd rather not risk it so I came off ppi for 2 weeks prior to tests (stool / endoscopy). Then went back on after. Just used Gaviscon and strict diet for the 14 days whilst off meds.
One thing that not many docs know is that ppi can cause h pylori to spread from the Antrum up to the Corpus of the stomach (happened to me!). It made my symptoms much much worse. Once the infection was eradicated I could tolerate PPIs much better.
Either way the road to gastritis / ulcer recovery is DIET. Some people think they can take PPI and then eat / drink what they want, wrong!
Strict diet for 3 months and ppi cured me finally, but it requires discipline and patience.
Diet mistakes can irritate the stomach lining and cause pain and discomfort.
Acid is the worst offender (it ultimately causes ulcers!) but fat and alcohol and strong spices can also irritate.
if you're on ppi your acid is much reduced so likely diet errors are what are giving you pain. Keep a food diary and eliminate what irritates you.
It does sound like
You have gastritis. Just need to find out why
Thanks Paul, my diet isn't the best nor the worst either. I don't drink or smoke so I can rule that out. I will see how the food diary goes
Alcohol is a major irritant so it's good you've cut that out.
Give me a typical days eating and il try see what could irritate you.
My diet yesterday was shreddies with semi skimmed milk for breakfast. No lunch, for evening meal chicken on wholemeal bread and 2 x chocolate bars afterwards. My diets been only 2 meals a day and not 3 set meals. Today's diet was much the same. The problem is there is no let up from the discomfort. The last 2 days have seen zero spice and fat.