Pain in upper middle abdomen (not on the right): can it be caused by gallbladder?

Hi,

In the last 2.5 years I 've been having severe pain once in every 6 to 8 weeks, exactly in the middle, a few centimeters under the breastbone. When this happens, I usually wake up with the pain during the night (in a few cases it starts in the evening or during the day). The pain is heavy and gets worse by lying down, so I have to get up and sit or stand (moving makes no difference, but lying down makes it worse). In most cases the pain has lowered enough within a few hours to be able to go back to sleep and has typically disappeared when I wake up in the morning.

I always thought it was reflux since it gets worse by lying down. However, reflux medication (Rennie, Gaviscon) seems to have no effect at all during such an attack. I also wonder if reflux can hurt this much.

The pain does seem to occur more often after a heavy meal / meal with a lot of fat but still such meals definitely don't always give me problems.

Last week there was an attack which took longer than normal: about 20 hours. The GP sent me for an ultrasound, which could take place only five days later. The ultrasound showed several gall stones although no acute infections. The bile ducts were not dilated according to the doctor, but I was told they were exactly on the cutoff value of 7 mm, so borderline normal.

Now the question is if these pain attacks can be related to the gall stones. I have my doubts since the pain is exactly in the middle, not on the right. Also, I often feel a - much less severe - pain on the location where I assume the gall bladder would be, but this is definitely not the location of the heavy pain (on the right vs. in the middle).

The doctor who did the ultrasound told me that while the gall bladder may be on the right, the bile ducts can be in the middle, so maybe this is possible after all.

Also, you often hear that a gall bladder attack is as painful as having a baby, I 'm not sure if what I 'm feeling is that painful, although very painful, but of course I cannot know since I have never had a baby.

I know I should discuss this with a doctor, but the GP 's advice is to just wait and see, which I have been doing for 2.5 years. I have some questions but they are not really about my specific case:

• Is there a way to know for sure whether or not pain in the upper middle part of the abdomen is caused by gallbladder issues?
• If not, what could be other causes?
• If the pain is indeed caused by gallstones, should the pain be located at the location of the gallbladder or at the location of the bile duct? What kind of distance can exist between both?
• Would it make sense to do an ultrasound during such an attack (instead of 5 days later) to see if it is actually caused by gallbladder issues?
• Can the borderline normal bile duct size of 7 mm (5 days after the attack) be an indication that maybe there had been an issue 5 days before?

Any information is welcome. Thank you in advance!

By the way, I am female and in my thirties.

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