[Vicky.]

Originally Posted by DemolitionRed

From what I'm understanding Vicky, they are treating the symptoms without knowing the cause? Have they tried/attempted to give you a diagnosis of anything?

They aren't even treating the symptoms properly as the oramorph gives me a little bit of relief but only lasts like an hour, then I have to wait 3 hours for the next does (officially, as it happens I take it whenever necessary as its such a low dose I know I cannot OD on it and I would rather not be in pain when theres a way not to be, but this is how I end up with none for 3/4 days a week :S)

They originally diagnosed costocondritus. But then a specialist said that was a ridiculous diagnosis as the pain is in the wrong place to be that. Then they said it may be caused by gallstones, so took out my gallbladder and ****ed it up which left me in more pain than before as they had to open me back up to do a 'washout' and they had cut my bile duct too so I had to have huge drains out of my chest for 2 weeks which left me with new pain ontop of the old pain. Luckily the nerve damage caused by the drains is treated very effectively with the 600mg pregabin that they give me per day. I also since having gallbladder out, have had huge digestive issues and a very bad stomach ache on a regular basis. And feel sick near constantly, which is controlled by cyclizine pretty effectively, but not always.

And after this, nothing for 2 years. They did blood tests every so often which show inflammation but obviously..doesn't tell them where the inflammation is.

Recently they also tried a nerve block into my spine, which they called an 'intercostal muscle injection'...which was apparently meant to be a kind of long lasting anaesthetic if it worked. Which it did not, and left me again in more pain than before. 3 days after the injection I could not move at all and then after this I get random shooting pains up my spine. It did not relieve the pain at all..which was awful as I had been waiting for it for a year and looking forward to it as I had been lead to believe it was very very likely to be effective. I broke down in the GPs about this and they said that it was not likely to be effective, but it was done for diagnostic reasons so they can rule stuff out rather than expecting it to help me. So I was lied to, and again, what they tried to do left me worse off.

So yeah, pretty pathetic story so far. Everything they have tried to do to help me seems to have gone wrong (apparently them knacking up a keyhole gallbladder removal is really really rare, so just my luck they did mine wrong eh...) and what they are giving me to deal with the pain in the meantime does not even work properly.