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Just had first endoscopy this morning....

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andrea44515
andrea44515

I just wanted to post something that might give some comfort to anyone else who has to have an endoscopy and has got themselves into the state i did before this morning!

I arrived at the hospital at 9.00 for my first ever endoscopy this morning.  All week I had been getting more and more worried about it and by the time I got there i absolutely terrified! I asked for sedation but they couldn't give it as I didnt have anyone at home permantely for the rest of the day.  Well as you can imagine this did absolutely nothing to make me feel any calmer!

So I did the grown up thing, sat on the bed, burst into tears and said I couldn't go through with it.  The poor young doctor was absolutely lovely as were the two nurses and did everything they could to calm me down.  The doctor even pointed out that if you can eat then you can cope with this proceedure quite easily.  As it turned out he was right.....

My throat was sprayed, I lay down on my left side and the mouth guard was inserted.  Contrary to all the horror stories I have read I was able to breathe completely normally, though my throat just felt a bit weird.  The doctor asked me to do a big swallow and that was it, we were away.  I didnt even gag!  The nurses talked to me the whole time reminding me to deep breathe and the whole proceedure took about 5 minutes.

The secret for me was to really keep taking big deep breaths and to focus on doing this the whole time.  

The doctors and nurses are there to help you through the whole thing and they certainly got me through mine!

As you can see I am the worlds biggest baby but i can hand on heart say that even though its not very pleasant, it is certainly nowhere near as bad as some stories would have you believe and for me it was absolutely more than bearable. 

Obviously I can only talk from my personal experience and it is not going to be the same for everyone, but I spent so long getting myself worked up and really wish I hadnt now.  

I would have no hesitation in doing it this way again and really hope this has helped to make even one more person feel a little bit better about having it done.  

0 likes, 5 replies

5 Replies

  • emlou487
    emlou487 andrea44515

    Posted

    Well lucky you Andrea.My experience was terrible and would definitely NOT go through it again.I chose the spray as I did not want sedation,after reading posts online,I thougt it would not be too bad,how wrong I was.I layed down on my left side,they inserted the mouth piece,the starting shoving the camera in.I took a deep breath and it did go down first time,but I could feel the whole thing,it kept hitting the base of my stomach which then made air come up and I kept burping repeatedly,he kept ramming it up and down and I was nearly sick,then i kept choking,in the end,the distress I was in left me hardly able to breath,so they pulled it out.I could not hold back the tears when I sat up.It made my stomcah sore for 2 days!They did find a rolling hernia and asked for a barium swallow,which I have since had and they say it is not a hernia.I have not heard back from anyone since and that was 3 months ago!Still cannot swallow and keep having panic attacks,as I cannot breath!GP keeps saying they are chasing it up,but nothing,typical NHS!!  sad
    • andrea44515
      andrea44515 emlou487

      Posted

      You poor thing, that does sound horrible and its no wonder you feel traumatised!  It must also be incredibly frustrating to not have an answer yet.  

      I do feel I was one of the lucky ones and its obviously not going to be the same experience for everyone but there are so many poor people out there who have had bad experiences with this proceedure that I think its important to say when there is a (fairly!) positive experience to show that it can be done.

      Really hope you get some answers soon.

  • james15699
    james15699 andrea44515

    Posted

    they are setting up this test for me had gerd in past got it under controll b ut jut had acute gassrittius have a hernia tha is pushing up my intestins into my stomach afried this test will hinder my health untill i get this hernia fix why can they not give me a son a gram of the stomach please reply to this question i am total scard to get this done and no one wents to talk about it not even my doctor please help me
  • lady40s
    lady40s andrea44515

    Posted

    Hi Andrea , i founf your post a comfort , im glad it went ok in the end ...im terrified ...im going to ask for one , iv seen my gastrologist last week , i have IBS and now recently indigestion , hes givenme omeprozol which has helped greatly , and is reluctant to do an endoscopy ...hes talked it through and is happy to not do it at the moment as i suffer with severe  health anxiety ...he is happy i have IBS and indigestion many people have it , and has assured me nothing sinister going on.... 

    but im so worried hes missing something ...i cant sleep im so worried . so im going to ask to ahve it done ....is this mad to opt for this ? should i just accept what hes saying ...hes the expert i guess ...im just so unsure ...sorry big rant just hoping for some advice , support as i so worried ...

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