Varices and my hospital stay

[Guest guest]

Hello all!

Well I just got back from nearly a week in the hospital. Tuesday I felt

pretty sick most of the day. I thought it was some kind of intestinal

flue, but made a dctors apointment for the next day just to make sure it

wasn't liver related. Then about 6:00 in the evening I got extremely

nauseated, and started vomiting. Well, to make a long story short, I

vomited about six cups of blood, nearly passed out, and my wife rushed

me off to the emergency room. They admitted me immediately when i

described the situation... I guess I was pretty pale at that point... I

remember someone saying to get me a wheelchair cause I was white as a

sheet.

Anyway they looked down my throat with a scope, and determined that I

had varices (which was what I suspected as soon as I started vomiting

blood).

The upshot of the whole thing was a couple days in ICU, and a couple

more in a regular room, five units of blood, and another scope to band

off some of the varices.

So what I'm wondering is if anyone else here who has had similar

problems has any advice or info on what this will mean. Is there

anything i can do to help prevent recurrence (diet or activity etc.)?

How would this affect me as far as being listed for tx? Right now I'm

not listed.... last set of blood work wasn't bad enough to get on the

list.

Any words of wisdom would be appreciated!

athan