Surgery
I need to find a Gastroenterologist around here who will perform surgery w/out insurance..... *sigh* I need to have a stent removed from my biliary duct.
Back in '97 I had to have an emergency gallbladder surgery. They had to leave a stent in the biliary duct to allow it to drain - I didn't realize it needed to be removed. Year later, in 2003, I kept having pain... I was sick.. And noone knew what was going on. My liver was giving me problems, horrible pain, vomitting yellow bile(?), back pain, bad chills, and I was jaundiced. I ended up being taken to the ER by ambulance, my blood pressure was dropping, I was really out of it. They found that it was the stent causing the trouble.. It had caused an E Coli bacterial bloodstream infection. I almost died.
They had to put another stent in place to let the biliary duct drain. I was scheduled to have the stent removed in late July '03, but we were planning to move here a week before.. I figured i'd be able to get the stent out somewhere here in VA... But, I ran into a problem. When I tried to find a doc to do the surgery, noone would do it w/out the payment up front.... Because I don't have insurance.
It's been almost 4 years now.. And it needs to come out. I have been sick since October. I had caught the flu or a bad, bad virus, and was sick for weeks. Antibiotics had taken care of the worst of it, but i'm still sick... For the last few weeks i've been having upper abdominal pain (around the liver, biliary duct area). It woke me up twice, it felt like something expanding internally. Almost like a balloon filling... Then, I vomitted, and it slowly went away... Then, it happened while I was awake, and the same thing.. After vomitting, it gradually went away. But last night... It was bad.. I honestly thought something was going to rupture. I had a hard time breathing.. It hurt to sit, to lay down.. It hurt to stand.. I was so freaked out. Vomitting didn't help this time. It just kept getting worse. It finally started to go away while I was getting ready to go to the ER. I have a doc appt on Tuesday... I'm hoping the doc can help me find a surgeon.
Back in '97 I had to have an emergency gallbladder surgery. They had to leave a stent in the biliary duct to allow it to drain - I didn't realize it needed to be removed. Year later, in 2003, I kept having pain... I was sick.. And noone knew what was going on. My liver was giving me problems, horrible pain, vomitting yellow bile(?), back pain, bad chills, and I was jaundiced. I ended up being taken to the ER by ambulance, my blood pressure was dropping, I was really out of it. They found that it was the stent causing the trouble.. It had caused an E Coli bacterial bloodstream infection. I almost died.
They had to put another stent in place to let the biliary duct drain. I was scheduled to have the stent removed in late July '03, but we were planning to move here a week before.. I figured i'd be able to get the stent out somewhere here in VA... But, I ran into a problem. When I tried to find a doc to do the surgery, noone would do it w/out the payment up front.... Because I don't have insurance.
It's been almost 4 years now.. And it needs to come out. I have been sick since October. I had caught the flu or a bad, bad virus, and was sick for weeks. Antibiotics had taken care of the worst of it, but i'm still sick... For the last few weeks i've been having upper abdominal pain (around the liver, biliary duct area). It woke me up twice, it felt like something expanding internally. Almost like a balloon filling... Then, I vomitted, and it slowly went away... Then, it happened while I was awake, and the same thing.. After vomitting, it gradually went away. But last night... It was bad.. I honestly thought something was going to rupture. I had a hard time breathing.. It hurt to sit, to lay down.. It hurt to stand.. I was so freaked out. Vomitting didn't help this time. It just kept getting worse. It finally started to go away while I was getting ready to go to the ER. I have a doc appt on Tuesday... I'm hoping the doc can help me find a surgeon.