Re: elevated enzymes or not - the pain feels the same to me!

[Guest guest]

,

I think that one of the problems with pancreatitis, as with many other

illnesses, is that there are often no absolutes. I am one of those who has had

some of my very worst attacks (in regard to pain, nausea, and vomiting) with

totally normal labs. I've had just about every combination you can think of -

attacks with elevated amylase, lipase, liver enzymes, and alk phos; attacks with

normal amylase, elevated lipase, liver enzymes, and alk phos; attacks with

normal amylase, lipase, liver enzymes, but elevated alk phos; and then attacks

with everything pretty much normal. I now have an internal med doc and GI who

say that we cannot go by the labs, we have to go by my symptoms. However, I

still have trouble with getting many doctors to believe that.

The one thing that I have learned with my many illnesses is that when a patient

does not present with text book symptoms, many doctors cannot or will not see

beyond what is written in black and white. I am one of those patients who very

rarely presents with text book symptoms. I can have a raging urinary tract

infection and have no burning at all, have the office dipstick say there's no

infection, yet when I insist they culture the urine, there's a nasty infection.

The only symptom I have might be increased frequency and maybe a bladder spasm

now and again. No fever, no elevated white count, etc. We now know why I

almost never have an elevated white count. I have a genetic IgG deficiency which

causes my normal white blood count to be below normal. In addition to that, I

have lupus and liver disease, both of which can lower your white blood count.

When my white blood count is in the normal range, I probably have an infection.

However, getting doctors who are not familar with my history (and who have not

read the letter from my hematologist explaining things about my individual case)

to believe that is impossible, so I don't even bother.

I used to think medicine was an exact science. You go to the doctor, they do a

few tests and they find out exactly what is or is not wrong with you. However,

we all know it is nowhere near that simple. Some doctors do understand that

medicine is not black and white and that you often have to really dig and pay

attention to the small stuff to get answers. However, most doctors never get to

the point where they understand that. It is incredibly frustrating, but we have

to realize doctors are human and they often make mistakes. If I had a nickel

for every time I was told my pancreas (or my liver) was perfectly healthy when

it ends up that both were far from healthy, I'd never have to worry about money

again! I bet most people in this group could probably say the same thing! I

was just telling my husband last night that it is often very hard for me to

trust my doctors because so many times in the past, previous doctors have told

me that things were perfectly okay only for me to find out later how very wrong

the doctor was! That's not the case with most of my current doctors, so I am

trying to learn to trust them. However, I have so very many doctors that ended

up being wrong in the past, it is hard for me to totally trust even the doctors

that finally found some answers for me. I guess if we really think about it, we

can totally trust only God and ourselves!

W.

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