Question about Intussusception... Am I a Ticking Time Bomb?
My wife suggested that I return to my bypass surgeon for his opinion. I discussed my history with him and he sent me for a cat scan with contrast. The scan revealed an intussusception! My surgeon and I decided that he would perform an exploratory procedure and correct the problem.
When I woke up in recovery, he informed me that my intussusception was not found. However what he did find was a Paraescophageal Hernia! Apparently part of my stomach had moved up into my food pipe and was the source of all the acid. What amazed me was with all the tests and specialists that I've seen, not one of them suspected a hernia. In fact two of them said there was no evidence of a hernia!
Getting back to your issue, my surgeon has suggested that my intussusception may return again one day but until it does, there is not much he can do. So like you, I wonder when or if it will return. Good Luck.
The whisked me in and conducted a CT scan which revealed the sneaky intussussception. I chose to have the paramedics take me to the hospital where I had my bariatric surgery and luckily one of bariatric surgeons was on call that night and took me into surgery. The intussussception occurred where the old stomach reconnected with the common bowel. He did not have a reason for the exact cause for the incident and said that there is a chance for recurrence, but put in place some stitches to help prevent my bowel from telescoping over itself in that area, but he could not guarantee it would happen again.
It is a rare complication of the bypass surgery that might occur. The cause is often unknown and the predictability of a recurrence is possible, but not known. Sorry I couldn't help more. I hope it doesn't reoccur for you.
Hi, I don't know if you have found the answer to this yet or not, but I too have been having the same problem.
I am going to paste a post I posted on Facebook about it. I'd love to know what you've found out if anything.
I've never in my life been treated so badly by a Dr. as I was today. I personally don't like going to the doctor, I'd rather just deal with the pain and let it pass. People who know me, know that about me. But today I was sent to see Dr. Clinton Twaddell. He walked in with nothing in his hands, he sat down asked me what was going on, I told him about the severe pain I have been having and he seriously sat there and said, "Ok, so" I told him I was concerned and want to know what is causing it because it was one of the worse pains in my life and it scared me.
After he pushed around on my stomach he said well there is nothing wrong with you.
I asked him if maybe I needed to go see a gastric bypass surgeon that is more familiar with Roux-en-Y Bypass patients, and he told me no cause there is no reason to.
2 years ago, I first had this bad pain and the CT scan showed I had a intussusception, which is a telescoping intestine. He saw me then and told me there was no way that that could be what was wrong with me as I was not in enough pain. I told him then that I have a very high pain tolerance. The pain was gone within a few days, so I believed it must not be anything and it was a one time thing. Then last year it happened again. Not as bad as first time, but it was enough to send me to the doctor. This time by the time I had the 2 CT scan, several days later, the pain was gone and nothing showed. This past week I had the worst episode ever and the worst pain I have ever had in my life. But I suffered through it cause I didn't want to go to the ER by myself. I finally cried myself to sleep and woke up feeling better. Went to work, in mild pain, but nothing like the night before, but I called the doctor anyhow. He sent me to have a CT scan and I swear 10 minutes before they took me back the pain stopped. Of course CT scan showed nothing.
After doing some research on patients who have had RYN bypass surgery I found out that it is actually quite common for us to have intussusception. I also found out that we don't present as normal intussusception patients. That it is also quite common for the intestine near the Y to telescope in and out causing great pain and then for some reason or other releasing. However, it does not always release and many have died from it or have had serious effects from it. Therefore, it is recommended that emergency surgery be done to correct the intestine. They take out the weakened intestine and just reattach it. I'm telling you this because I want you to know this is what I told him after he said there is nothing wrong with me. I asked him how I'm supposed to know when or if it is bad enough that I need to go to the hospital. I am not trying to say this is what is wrong with me, but everything points to this being the cause. Remember the first CT scan did catch it, and there was a partial block, just not complete at that time. When I asked if this is what is happening to me how am I supposed to know when I am supposed to go to the hospital, or when it is serious enough to be concerned about, he said and I quote, "You are not dead, you are alive you're fine and there is nothing wrong with you!" and then he turned and walked out the door. I was so angry, I never in my life wanted to tell a doctor off, but I wanted to tell him off. I cannot believe that a doctor can have that kind of bed side manner and still be in practice, but I guess when that is the only surgeon your doctor refers you to cause he is in their office I guess that is what you get. I guess I just heard what I didn't want to hear, it's all in my head!
Thanks for listening to me blow off steam!!
I don't know if you are still looking into this since you were concerned that it might happen again. I did have an Intussusception 7 1/2 years ago about 2 1/2 years after my open RNY. In my case a portion of intestine died (according the the surgeon it was 6 - 8 inches they had to remove) and I was in such bad shape when they finally figured out what was going on, I was told when I woke up that I almost didn't wake up and that I was very fortunate they diagnosed it when they did. My symptoms presented around midnight on a Monday night. I immediately knew something was seriously wrong and I drove myself to an ER (I was a single mom, my girls were 10 and 13). The doctor at that ER knocked me silly with pain meds, wrote it up as a UTI due to blood in my urine and called someone in my cell phone address book to come pick me up. A visit to my GP the next day was also a waste. He thought it was a bad stomach virus due to seeing what he thought was gas in my intestinal tract and sent me home. He did tell me that if things got worse I needed to go back to the ER. Within a couple of hours of getting home I was vomiting blood. I went to a different ER couresy of a friend that night (it is Tuesday evening now) and I was on the floor of the waiting room shaking, sweating and vomiting blook into plastic bags for 6 hours and I never made it in to triage. I finally asked my friend to take me home. I was ready to just die in peace. At 5am Wednesday a co-worker that I was very close to and just started seeing came by when he couldn't reach me by phone. He was persistent and finally got my gp on the phone (it never occurred to me to call my bypass dr as I had not had any issues post op up to this point. I was the perfect success story, could eat anything with very rare dumping, lost from 300 down to 135, no vomiting until this happened, no stomach pain). My gp sent us to the hospital where he was registered (probably not the right word), but he said if they didn't get me in that he would come to the hospital and get involved as he was very concerned with my symptos getting progressively worse. During this entire time the pain never relented. It was the worst pain I have ever had. When I went in the first time, I told the dr in the ER that something was wrong and that I was going to die if they didn't find what it was. I knew it was that bad. Third hospital and I had a knot in my abdomine protruding the size of a very large grapefruit and they immediately realized what was going on. I got an NG tube to pump the blood out of stomach and they had me in surgery within about 3 hours of going in. At this point, I could not stand up anymore.
A six day hospital stay and I went home. I was told that I'm not at risk of it happening again (but at the time I went in, the DR I saw had never had an Intussusception case and after mine he said he did some research and found only one other reported after a rny. This was in January of 2005. I don't know where he looked or if there were others he didn't find. I have had some stomach issues since then and honestly, it frightens me when I have pain similar to the pain from the blockage. I stretched a pouch after the surgery because my weight dropped way too low and my dr told me to start eating more and occasionally something will hang up in the pouch and it backs things up. I will have similar pain only it will let up after a while where the complete blockage that caused the section of intestine to die never got better until I woke up from surgery. I competely understand how frightening it is to have that pain. I can't imagine how I would have felt if they put me through the surgery for nothing. In my case the surgery saved my life. It was an open procedure and I had 20+ staples. It makes sense that is the blockage was caused from a weakness and it telescoped and then worked itself out that it could happen again. If you check and see this, I would love to know how you are doing now. If the problem has persisted or if you are doing well without symptoms at this point. After my surgery, I was admitted to the hospital a week later with similar pain and I was told that the intestines had twisted but that it would work itself out. Due to the extreme pain I was in they kept me another 3 days and kept me heavily sedated (so much so that they put me on oxygen). A week later, I was having pain again and the dr on call when I called the hospital said that if I came in the first thing he would do was give me an NG tube and that was such a horrible experience that I opted to suffer at home. I put myself on a liquid diet (what they had done when I was admitted the second time) and it worked itself out. Now if I start to have any pain that resembles that, I go to a liquid or soft diet for a few days. It's never been sever again like it was but I did this search as I've been having more frequent stomach upset lately and there is so much more information than there was when I had issues in 2005.
My Intussusception was right at the point where my new smaller stomach was attached to the intestine. I don't know if this is the same place that you have issue. I do not regret the bypass surgery as I can only imagine what my life would be like now if I had not lost the weight. After a back injury and surgeries, I have gained a little weight back and I'm currently working to lose it. I am 5'7 and was briefly as high as 175, but I am back down to 154. Since I fluctuated between 135 and 139 for several years, my goal is to be less than 140, so I have 15 pounds to go. I have to admit that losing weight is harder than I thought it would be since it was very easy right after the bypass and easy to maintain for years. I refuse to gain back the weight after everything I went through to lose it.
I hope you are doind well.
Candace
Hi Candace,
Well here I am again yes it has happened again more then I had thought just not as bad as the first time. Apparently it happens on a regular basis with me I just dont go into hospital until the pain wraps around my back from my stomach then i go in. I found a awesome surgeon he found out what the issue is and its a peterson hernia which causes the intussusception yes mine is located same place as yours so now i must go have surgery in a few weeks to fix the peterson hernia and if that doesnt work then get the staple for the intussusception to prevent it from telescoping back in. please keep in touch with me. splashnjune at g mail.
It has happened more then once I have just not gone in er until it was so bad I couldnt tolerate the pain. The peterson hernia starts at the bottom of my rib cage like a charlie horse huge knot then my stomach gets hard as a rock like in pain in need to use the restroom some times get relieved when use the restroom but when it wraps around to my back is when I better get my self to the hospital and fast. See found out the peterson hernia is what is causing the intussusception I go see my surgeon on the 27th to set up a appointment to take care of the peterson hernia he said no guarantee that it will fix it if it doesnt then we go in and get the intestine stapled to keep it from slipping .
I am almost 5 years post op and I have had 2 Intussusception surgeries to fix intussuscetpions (and a few other times of going to the ER but it telescoping out before a true diagnosis). I have been taken to the hospital 2 times by ambulance, 1 time I have been transferred from 1 hospital to another to be able to have the surgery.
My first surgery was about 2 years post surgery. That surgery required removal of part of my intestines. The second surgery was almost 2 years to the day from the 1st intussusception. My surgeon didn't have to remove any of my intestine and he "tacked" my intestines to where they should be in my stomach.
The last surgery was a year ago and I am having severe abdominal pain again. I have a barium CT scan planned on Tuesday (if I can make it 4 days). I keep hoping it will just come out without surgery but I have felt this before and had these symptoms enough that I now KNOW. The sad part is I have had 3 ER visits in which the Intussusception un-telescoped before diagnosis. I was glad it corrected itself but it does lead ER docs to think you are there just for meds :( It is sad when you go into an ER and you are able to tell them exactly what you need, how it needs done and basically tell them that they should just contact the surgeon right away cause it will require surgery.
I keep hoping and praying this time is different. I know my surgeon mentioned he might have to change the gastric bypass and do something different if I had another bad intussusception so I am even more worried.
Just thought I would share my story on this. I know my story is not the "ordinary" but there are cases of it. I guess getting down in weight and living a happier and healthier lifestyle does have the consequence of intussusception surgeries for me :( I am just grateful I have good insurance this time unlike last year!
My daughter has intussisception and has been in debilitating pain for almost a year now. Fortunately they were able to see the intussisception on an MRI so we have proof. We are in the process of finding a surgeon who will preform corrective surgery. I just wanted to get an update on your case. Hopefully you are well now since your post was so long ago and have a surgeon you can recommend.
