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Mystery Left Rib Left Quandrant Back Pain LUQ Pancreas?

Posted , 14 users are following.

panxious
panxious

Hey all,

Like many of you on this forum, I too, am searching for answers that the doctors just don't seem to have at this point. I started feeling sick around the end of July 2015.

My symptoms initially were

-bad heartburn

-constant burping

-constant nausea without vomiting

-a burning sensation in my upper left quandrant

-pain under my left rib cage

After pleading with my primary doctor that this was more than just reflux, she did agree to some testing. So far I've had:

-Abdominal CT scan with contrast (due to trace amounts of blood in my urine) They did not find kidney issues, however, they did find 2 lesions on my liver "consistent with oral contraceptives".

-Abdominal MRI to further verify that the liver lesions were from oral contracpetives. Nothing else was found on the MRI

-Upper endoscopy and colonoscopy-no ulcers. Tissues and polyps were biopsied. Nothing remarkable was found. The doctor concluded that there was "non-specific inflammation in my colon and lower intestine. Possibly due to Ulcerative Colitis"

I was on PPI's for a while and decided to stop them. Still have burning/heartburn but it's not a severe as it was. My left rib pain comes and goes but most alarming are the new symptoms:

-constant burping (even after water)

-upper left back pain (can be burning/needling/stinging or just soreness)

-lower left back pain-very intense, not sure if it's in the kidney area

-non specific nausea every morning upon waking

-Fatigue, fatigue, fatigue! I can't stress this enough. I'm so tired all the time and I don't know why. It's not relieved from rest.

-Low Blood pressure

-Intermittent dizziness

-Pounding heartbeat/pulse. I notice this happens a lot as I am falling asleep and sometimes it wakes me up, as I can feel my heart beating so hard

-Itching around my left rib cage

I cannot attribute these symptoms to any specific food type

The problem is, none of my syptoms have been related to UC, which can be quite severe and can interfere with your life. I don't go to the bathroom multiple times a day and definitely don't have blood in my stool or diarrhea.

Went to a 2nd gastro for another opinion in October. He read the report from the endo/colonscopy and basically asked "so why are you here?"

I explained to him that the 1st gastro wanted to put me on Entocort for 3 months to see if that would alleviate my symptoms (it's a steriod for UC). However, I disagreed that this was the correct diagnosis as I didn't present the symptoms of UC, aside from the internal inflammation.

I told him I was concerned about this being pancreas related, given that my left side and back pain could be referred from the pancreas area.

He looked at me as if I was crazy and said that I don't have a family history and that the MRI would have most certainly ruled out any possibility of that. He also said I was too young and that "he hasn't seen anyone under the age of 40 diagnosed with pancreatic cancer"

He has since tested me for:

-Lactose intolerance: negative

-Fructose malabsorption: negative

-Parasites in my stool: negative

-WBC in my stool: negative

Per my conversation with him, I agreed to take 6 weeks of the Entocort to see if it helped. I'm on week 5 and it has done nothing to relieve the symptoms. I have a follow up with him in the 2nd week of December.

I guess I am just wondering where to go from here. I can't help but wonder what else this could possibly be, if not pancreas related. Gallbladder issues typically present in the right side of the body and are severely painful. I would not classify my pain as severe, but nagging.

 

0 likes, 18 replies

18 Replies

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  • nicola27252
    nicola27252 panxious

    Posted

    I might also have to look into the more alternative route for my issues. The pantoprazole worked for about a month, but now the luq pain and heartburn are back again. I've run out of options and answers. Being in pain 24/7 is so consuming, I can't enjoy anything anymore. Especially with the holidays coming up, I want to enjoy time (and food and drink) with my family

  • helen09976
    helen09976 panxious

    Posted

    This sounds a lot like what I've gone through, and I have Chronic Pancreatitis. Its pretty painful and I feel it most intensely on the left side under the bottom of the left ribs, and on through to the back. I usually take acid and gas medicine, because gas and gastritis aggravate or magnify the pain, so I try to rule those out. You can ask the doctor if they would let you have a Lab slip to check Lipase and Amylase on a day you feel particularly crappy. If those are 3 times the normal limit, if can be helpful to the doctors to know that. The other way to figure it out is if you lose your appetite those days. That's a pretty particular feature to pancreatitis. Finally, see if it helps the pain if you fast for a day, (or limit yourself to very light helping of plain boiled white rice and plain boiled shredded chicken). That always makes me feel better the next day. If the longer you fast, the better you feel, that might help the doctors narrow in on digestive processes.

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