My cancer journey

[Ed_K]

 Along with back pain I now have a hernia above my belly button, haven't gotten an explaination yet but hope it's maybe just an inflamation of the navel. Anyway everything is waiting on Dr. appointments.

[Bruno of NH]

Ed
Still praying for you Sir
Pain can be a tough thing day after day

[Ed_K]

 Got a letter from the Dr. that ordered the ct-scan, it said that I have a hernia above my navel. But suprise suprise I also have Gallstones too  :( >:( . I know what's involved with kidney stones, but what do you do with gallstones?
 I've gone past 3 times and your out, I don't know how much more I can take.

[YellowHammer]

My daughter had them.  A little incision maybe a half inch across, then they pull out the gall bladder, and done.  They use to try medicines to shrink them but my daughters doc says that can really cause problems if one of the stones hangs on the way out. So they skip that part and pull the whole gall bladder out with minimal cutting.  My daughter was back at work the next day and wasn't even very sore that she mentioned.      

[thecfarm]

My wife had them.
Don't want to hear her story. 
When I went down to see here in the hospital, there was always a different woman in her semi-private room. 
Really nothing to it.
Just have to watch those hamburgers you eat. 
Can come out pretty quick now.
But saying that wife is fine with it.

[doctorb]

Before we put you through a gall bladder surgery, let's ask a couple of questions.  Were the gall stones just an incidental finding on CT scan?  In other words, have you been having abdominal issues potentially related to gall bladder issues which prompted the CT scan?  Lots of people have gall stones and don't know it.  We don't usually rush in to remove them unless they are symptomatic.  Has your doc told you need them removed?

[doc henderson]

you may not need a surgery for either.  go ask you doc.  it becomes needed if a stone gets stuck causing obstruction, or bowel get stuck in the hernia.  It is not usually subtle.   :(

[Ed_K]

 I think the gall stones were an after thought. I haven't had any pain from them or the hernia. I just got scared when I went to get up one morning and there was this huge bump on my belly. It has gotten smaller. I recieved a report on the hernia and stones, but I have to wait for Rita to find it and she's working at the fair church booth. 

[Ed_K]

 Well i'm going to write what the paper say's " A small umbilical hernia is present containing fat and no associated bowel. Measurements are 12 x 7 x 8 mm with a 7x8 mm neck no other hernias present are present in the anterior abdominal wall or elsewhere."

 I don't see how those numbers being so small can make a bulge that looked like 4" across and 8" long when I raised up to sitting position in bed.

[doc henderson]

If you push on it, and it feels like a soggy water balloon nearly deflated, then it is just fluid communicating with the peritoneal fluid in the abdomen.  you can bear down and make it blow up like a balloon.  If bowel gets through the hole that is small, it begins to fill with gas and fluid, and no longer fits back through the hole.  like bending your finger as tight as possible and sticking the knuckle though a hole and when you pull back it is too big like a rivet or Chinese handcuffs.  i had one today.  the hole was the size of my finger tip, the bulge with bowel was tennis ball size so would not fit back through.  i held pressure after meds, and decompress the gas and fluid back through then the bowel went back in.  we tip the head down called reverse Trendelenburg.  As she recovered, she thought it was coming back through but it was just fluid.  hers was periumbilical.  if we cannot push it back in, then you get surgery to prevent dead bowel from ischemia as the blood vessel get crimped too.  it had caused a small bowel obstruction and that was relieved after the reduction.  this is why it is important not to wait too long.  we are not worried about fat, just the bowel for the most part.  cheers.

[Ed_K]

 Thank you Doc Henderson very much   . You gave us more information than both my VA Dr. and Cancer Dr. who's advice was " don't worry we'll talk about it at your next appt. >:( ".

[doc henderson]

Ed the one that is 8 inches long and fusiform like a football is usually called a ventral hernia, and almost never needs fixed.  it is weak or lack of muscle along the midline.  it only bulges when you are sitting up.  do your crunches.  It is what makes the centerline for those of us with a  pack 6.  I have a keg.   :D :D :D

[kantuckid]

Ed, as a side note to your lumbar pain issue:
 I tried 3 times during multiple (well over a dozen total) sciatic episodes to gain relief from a spinal injection called an epidural injection. I have spinal stenosis like you.
 Mine were all done by an anesthesiologist who does them sort of on the side to his regular hospital work at various locations having the gizmo (computed topography or another "scope" name I forget) which gives him a live picture of the needles insertion into your lumbar as he works. People line up for them all day when he's there. 
I tried a similar shot previous to a hip replacement during a shoulder surgery and the scope was already available for that orthopedic doc to see the hip shot placement spot. 
They all did zero for me and I'll never bother to try it again.
 One potential aspect in my (lack of) results is the timing, as sciatica lasts for ~ 8 weeks and this doc is so popular that it takes so much of the regular run of the problem, that your on the way to being OK by shot day.  

[kantuckid]

Story topper: I used to knew a guy (adult Veteran student of mine) who had what I'll call a double keg. He'd been gut shot in Vietnam and had too little abdominal muscles to hold his guts in thus he looked like a world champ beer gut guy.   

[doc henderson]

My experience with epidurals, (not mine, but family and patients) is they work about half the time if done for the right diagnosis, about the same as back surgery.  often with diffuse disease, it relieves pain at that site, and you become aware of pain at another.  it is also practitioner dependent.  some are better than others.

[Ed_K]

 I guess if I got relief from the L4-L5 area I'd find pain in another place.

 " Bones are very osteoporotic with large areas of bone loss throughout the skeleton with the most prominent area of bone loss focally located in the left ischium (4.5 cm long) extending to the left acetabulum which may predispose to fracture failure. Multiple compression fractures throughout the visible dorsal and the lumbar spine are present. Degenerated discs are seen throughout the lumbosacral spine as well."

Reading this I think all this pain will be nothing if my back bone falls apart. I have a appointment with my Myeloma Dr. tomorrow, we asked for more time to discuss all the things I'm worried about an his nurse called to say that it will be impossible as he has little time and can only talk about the cancer numbers.But he would call us later after work. I can't b___h about that.

[Ed_K]

 The specialist Dr. said that because the collapse isn't from the Myeloma,Kyphoplasty wouldn't help. The way he explained is that the 'hallway' that the sciatic nerve goes through is closing on the nerve, and that is what is causing the pain. He said he could 'fix" it, but how wasn't part of the discussion.

[Ed_K]

 It's been almost a month since I posted the above complaints. Can't believe it, but I have had problems and more problems. I found out that the back bone specialist could fix the nerve problem in L4-L5 and also L3-L4 (didn't know about L3-L4) where the vertebrate's are squeezing my sciatic nerve, but he won't fix it because of the cancer. On Sept. 9th we were splitting more house fire wood and late that night I found out I was in pain from my neck to the shoulder and half way down my back an front. I had an appointment to get my I.D. badge changed (so it has air force on it instead of army) So we decided to go to sick call and ask about the neck pain.
While there the nurse took my vitals and the machine showed my heart rate at 241. Well someone called 911 and next thing I know I'm going down the road in an ambulance with Rita following us. Got to the hospital and after 3 hrs they decided it was a mistake. We got that straightened out and got away from that sick place.

 The next 2 weeks we spent going to the V.A. for x-rays an MRI's, they couldn't figure out what the pain was, I finally asked if it could be a pinched nerve (well ya, that would make the pain). Well anyway the cancer side of me is doing ok at this point, I just hope my light chain #s keep going down. Aug # was 173 and Sept was 157 these numbers may be wrong I can't find the paperwork their on, but they're close. (note) always check white blood cells hemaglobin and light chains.

[Bert]

Sometimes you have to wonder what is hospital fundraising and what is real. The trip for the heart rate that wasn't necessary would have me seeing red. Praying for you Ed. 

[Bruno of NH]

Keep the faith Ed
I think about you daily 

[Ed_K]

 I stopped at the local V.A. close to home just to see if they have a sick call unit, well they asked what was wrong I said same thing that I went to the main V.A. for sick call. Desk clerk says sit down and a nurse will be right out. She brings me to a room and decides to do my vitals, the Dang pulse thing reads 210, I said that ain't right, so she goes and gets a machine an sticks these stickers all over me to find out the heart rate is at 120. Goes an gets my doc. He comes in an checks my pulse with his hand and says he got 104. He decides to have the hospital put a 24 hr monitor on me and lets me go, with a warning not to lift anything with my rt arm and not to do ant thing stressful. What a day I should have just gone to the dump an straight back home.

HAGD

[thecfarm]

That 24 hour monitor should tell them what is going on.
Brenda just had to wear one.
Goes right to the office.
Kinda like those game cameras.

[Autocar]

Prayers your way Ed can't imagine what your going though. Hang in there to cut some timber.

[kantuckid]

When I switched to a new, far more pro-active cardiologist, he had me log my BP at various times daily until my next visit a month later. That pattern told him more than any singular visit can do. Mine mostly never varies, other than during heavy exercise or when I encounter a hot young nurse doing my vitals :D. Seriously, when I come off the highway having driven from E KY to the city for a doc visit, my BP is up maybe 20-30 points for ~ 15 minutes upon arrival. 
He also has done a echo each 6 months of the first year, changed my statin, and now I'm on annual visits. 
Ed, I hope you get to a less worrisome place with this medical stuff. 

[Ed_K]

 I'm sitting here this morning with a heart monitor that's stuck to my chest. The nice nurse put it on yesterday and said wear it for 5 day then peel it off and put it in the box it came in and throw it into the mail . It will go to a lab in Illinois. They read it's little computer and than send the read out and what they think is wrong to the V.A. cardiologist. I guess after that I will find out what's wrong and also who this Dr. is that I've never seen.
Last night Rita was looking at my thyroid med and it reads 88 mg   :-\ it's supposed to read .88 mg, so now I'm waiting for my primary Dr. to call me. We wonder if this could be what's wrong with my heart rate, with our home bp machine it sometimes read 143  : , at the V.A. last week they got a 210 reading and we told them the machine was wrong  ;D. Guess they didn't like our answer cause they sent me for a ride in the ambulance to the hospital  >:( :( .