AllBodySurgery.com

Are gallstone cleanses effective and just as effective as gallbladder removal?

Upon getting Jaundice I went to the hospital to discover that I had gallstones blocking my ducts. I had a procedure to remove the stones today, and in just a few hours in the morning I'm scheduled for surgery to have my gallbladder completely removed. All nightI have been researching alternatives. While alot of people did not have complications with gallbladder removal, what if I'm one of the percentage who do have complications, or still experience the same symptoms even after the gallbladder is removed? I've also heard that removing the gallbladder puts strain on your other organs. Is this true? I really don't know what to do, need some opinions. I've researched some gallstone cleanses, I may ask if I can delay the surgery so that I can try those methods first. Has anyone done gallstone cleansing? Is just as effective as having the gallbladder removed? Have you tried any cleanses that worked for you? Thanks. :) I'm 18 years old.

Public Comments

1. di ko alam, pasensya!
2. I am 51 and had them since 14, I watch what I eat, no spicy, greasy foods or dairy product, cleaning only helps for a while as the stones can return, afterwards you still have to watch the spicy foods.
3. Anything that would be strong enough to dissolve a gallstone would not be very good for the rest of you, don't you think? As a matter of fact, there is a medication that will dissolve gallstones if they are made of cholesterol. BUT (before you cancel the surgery!) you will have to take it for a year to work. During that year, you have to follow a very very low fat diet, and have regular ultrasounds to monitor the stones to see they do actually dissolve. You will also have to have regular blood tests to keep tabs on your liver function. Of course, any time during that year, a stone can still slip in to block the ducts, and you will suffer another gallbladder attack. And if this isn't wonderful enough, although the medication does work, once you quit taking it, the stones most usually will return again- usually within a few years at best. And you will be back to square one again. Did I also mention the medicine isn't cheap either? Nope, it's not. Aside from this, there are no non-prescription treatments that are effective, honestly. You need to understand what kind of stone you likely have, there are two, pigment and cholesterol. In the research you do, see if you can find the explaination about how cholesterol based stones form. You will see it's a matter of balance, in cholesterol, bilirubin and bile salts. You produce all three of those, and have to all the time- to maintain healthy digestion and function. So while you can possibly dissolve these stones, you will have done nothing to prevent new ones forming. At your age, you probably have some genetic factors counting against you, and that means you are more than likely going to continue to form stones as long as you have a gallbladder to form them in. On the other hand, the only change your surgery makes is that you won't have a gallbladder for storage. Everything will still be produced, just not stored anywhere. No storage means no place to make stones in. The major problem folks have post removal is that they can't quite do the everything fried meals. But honestly, you really shouldn't eat that much fat anyway. Should you decide to, okay, you will suffer diarrhea and some seriously stinky gas- but it's not fatal. What you won't suffer is the horrible pain of a gallbladder attack, ever again. And you will enjoy a much wider selection of food than you can if you are suffering repeated gallbladder attacks. You have the normal pre-op jitters, and you are rather young for this to happen. All the more reason to go ahead and take care of matters now. The surgery is really easy to recoup from now, and the scars are really nearly unnoticeable. Two small cuts, maybe two or three stitches a piece. You will be back on your feet the same day. In fact, if you have your surgery tomorrow morning, you can be home in bed by nighttime. You spend one day after feeling sluggish and bloated from the gas they expand the abdomen with- but that's about the worst of it. There's almost no pain to speak of really, most patients use Tylenol post op, or Motrin at the most. Inside three days you will be back to your old self and eating what you like pretty much. I wouldn't recommend a fried chicken dinner, but a nice grilled steak and baked potato will sound pretty good and should digest just fine. Go for the surgery, you'll be glad you did. Don't go looking for problems that haven't happened yet. Likely they will not, most times they don't. And believe me, if there were a medication that would work to cleanse the gallbladder, they would use it. But it's really hard to dissolve things and not kill off others at the same time. So chill, get some sleep, and part with the gallbladder in the am. It's really not that bad.