Health: Gallstones in Old Age

Ki-Ki

Veteran
I have my grandmother in her 70's who has been suffering from Gallstones for what must be slightly over a year now. She's recently - past month. Lost a lot of weight, unfortunatly I haven't seen her in 6 - 8 months. But it was when my mother (whose now 7 months pregnant) visited her on the weekend she noticed a sudden weight loss.

My gran' is a 'well built' lady but i wouldn't say Obese. She worked in the kitchens and accordingly, just loves her food and cooking. But it's come to the point where she's lost allegedly around 10 stone, and you her eyes have dropped - you worryingly you can apparently see her cheek bone.

Naturally worried with the deterioration of her health, the mind start's eating away. She's led a very sad life and her husbands departed - so she's left looking after her 40 year old son with learning difficulties in a small house. She's always wanted to live in a cottage.

Looking into it, it didn't take long into a search to be presented with the 'C' word, Cancer.

Apparently if Gallstones are left untreated for a long period of time they can grow, and cause Cancer of the Gallbladder. A symptom of which is rapid weight loss. In itself Gallstones can cause this, but not so severe and not so late on I don't think.

She had blood work 2 weeks ago, nothing 'tumourish' came back. But apparently that doesn't really matter because the blood work can't always pick these things up.

My mother drove her up to the Doctors today, she's not eating and she basically was about to go in with a baseball bat if they weren't prepared to do something. Fortunatly she had the lucky chance to meet an old family Doctor whose sending her in now as an In-Patient within a fortnight.

Annoying to me is that at the moment is the fact that I refused to learn to drive for the past 5-6 years, now that I'm going to learn this year. It would have come in handy around now.


What I'm primarily wondering is if anyone else has had family or friends in a senior age with similar symptoms or who has suffered from Gallstones. So far 2010 isn't shaping up to be a good year, already been one death in the family on St. Valentines Day!

Sorry for the growling around, mind just feels a little better asking around to see if anyone's been in a similar boat - or known someone who has.

:)
 
What I'm primarily wondering is if anyone else has had family or friends in a senior age with similar symptoms or who has suffered from Gallstones. :)

Yeah, me. I had my gallbladder taken out when I was 23. No, I wasn't a senior citizen but gallstones are gallstones. I certainly did not fit the demographic. Male, young, in shape, etc. Gallstones usually afflict overweight women over 40. I'm thinking its genetic. My sister had hers taken out a few years ago...30's, thin, etc...

I suspect I suffered from symptoms for about a year. I often got low-grade fevers, some fatigue. But then one evening, I began experiencing an ache in my lower back. Within a few hours that ache turned into an EXCRUCIATING pain that was so intense I couldn't localize it. It went from my sternum, to my side, to my stomach, to my back, etc. I think the E.R. doctors thought I was faking it for drugs so they gave me a $70 dollar Advil and sent me home. Eventually, the pain subsided by noon the next day.

Then, one week later on the same day, same deal. The pain began in the lower back and wound up being excrutiatingly awful. So bad, I was throwing up and rubbing Aspercream all over my body because the intense burning feeling kept my mind off the pain. The E.R. docs finally believed that my pain was genuine and began to run the proper tests. Not only did I have 4 over-sized stones in my gallbladder but it had become gangrenous and was on the cusp of killing some of my other organs. So I had emergency surgery and was pumped full of morphine and anti-infection medicine for 8 days.

The moral of the story? Well, as a non-doctor, it is my opinion that your grandmother GET THAT GALLBLADDER THE F OUT OF HER BODY A.S.A.P!!!

-Rick
 
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