Fliss

[Guest guest]

Fliss,

thanks for the kind words, prayers, and information. I am under the care of

Gastroenterologist/Hepatologist that I think is very good. He specializes in

problems of the liver and pancreas, which is good for me because I have both

chronic pancreatitis and autoimmune liver disease. I have made an appt for my

mom to see him on Feb 25th. As for being sure my mom is having an attack of

acute pancreatitis, I think they are about as sure as they can be at this point.

I haven't seen her labs but my stepdad said her amylase was 151. Our lab says

normal is less than 100, so 151 is not greatly elevated. They had not checked

her lipase when I last spoke to my mom. It has to be sent out and takes two

days to get back, so they often do not check it. That's why it took so long for

me to get a diagnosis of cp. They kept saying it was liver causing the problems

because my amylase was normal. When I finally began to suspect that perhaps my

lipase was elevated despite a normal amylase, I went to a larger hospital in the

next town. Sure enough my amylase was around 50, but the lipase was close to

700. that's when my internal med doc called in my current GI and he immediately

diagnosed me with chronic panc. He added actigall and pancreas enzymes to my

already huge list of meds.

My mom has had symptoms that seemed to be consistent with a bad gallbladder for

at least a couple of years. However, the tests just come back normal so they

say her gallbladder is fine.

I'm trying my best to head off an attack myself. That's why I'm still up at

almost 2 a.m. I was having pain and nausea and couldn't sleep. I took meds and

hoped they would kick in and once again keep me out of the ER. Right now the

pain is better, but I almost feel like I am just postponing the inevitable.

thanks again for the info and prayers.