Anyone ever have a water soluable test? Mine is scheduled for a couple of weeks for now. The gist is they see if there are any leaks, I think - before they reconnect me and find out the hard way. I think there is an enema involved...do they go in the stoma? or the bum? I have not used my bum for so long I keep having visions of blowing barium all over the poor tech. :eek:

ALSO, this will be my first CT with the ileostomy. Do you still have to drink the contrast? Does it get absorbed in the pelvic region if you are diverted?

Maybe I'm doing too much thinking these days...just anxious to get these scans out of the way...terrifying.

Take care,
Cats

Anyone ever have a water soluable test? Mine is scheduled for a couple of weeks for now. The gist is they see if there are any leaks, I think - before they reconnect me and find out the hard way. I think there is an enema involved...do they go in the stoma? or the bum? I have not used my bum for so long I keep having visions of blowing barium all over the poor tech. :eek:

ALSO, this will be my first CT with the ileostomy. Do you still have to drink the contrast? Does it get absorbed in the pelvic region if you are diverted?

Maybe I'm doing too much thinking these days...just anxious to get these scans out of the way...terrifying.

Take care,
Cats

Cats:
Typically they do a gastrographic study. You don't do anything but lie there and try to hold it in as they pump a tracer solution up your rectum through a small tube so they can take pictures of your anastamosis (connection). They don't care about up by your stoma, just from your bum up to the stapled part. This will also also reveal if you have diverticula
(little pockets in your colon that if big enough can collect little seeds and food stuff so you can be careful not to get diverticulitis--infection of the diverticula when seeds get stuck which requires antibiotics and sometimes hospitalization). You don't leak too much, and when you do, they don't care-- they are used to it.

Afterwards, they have you stand up and go to the bathroom where much of the solution comes out. You will be surprised that when you stand up, and wait a little while longer, you will have a lot more to pass... so stay close to the bathroom!

I hope that helps. And by the way, the books are in the works and I will let you know when the books are published and on the shelf;)

Warm Regards,
CancerDad

Thanks CD,

Great tip...it's been a while since I've had to pull off a highway at the closest McDonald's running to the bathroom! I would have forgot about that.

And did you say bookS? plural? Good for you.

Thanks for the info.
Cats

Cats:
P.S. I forgot to tell you about CT scans with your ileostomy. Don't worry about it. You DO still need to drink the nasty "punch solution," but will notice some that comes through into your ileo bag. I actually had to drain mine once before the procedure. The radiologist told me that they give you extra (in normal doses, for people without an ostomy) to make certain enough is absorbed into your systemic circulation, and diffused into your tissue to show good pictures.

Anyway, hope that helps.:)

Good Luck,
CancerDad:angel:

I had something called pouchogram. I am not sure if it is same as "water soluable".

They inserted a tume into rectum and insrted about halg a galon of liquid. I had a feeling like I am going to have horrible diarrhea. There was lot cramping as well. But I was able to hold. After Xrays were taken, I rushed to bathroom. But not much came out. I had to go 7 -8 time in next 20 - 25 minutes. I went about 25 time in next 10 hours. It stopped during midnight.

I had some lumps of about 1 cm dia which I had to take out using my fingers as the opeinign was too smal for those. I am not sure what those lumps were.

Overall test wasn't so bad.

Do yourself a favor.
1. Get somebody to drive you back home.
2. Get a "Depend" or better "Diaper" for drive back to home. You will not have enough warning to be able to pull to McDonald. It will just rush out as you will not have any control as you have not use rectum during your ileo.

Hope this helps.
tahb.

My comments would pretty be the same much as CancerDad's, however, I didn't need to use the restroom afterwards, they put a tube up my bum, then put what looked like a lifesaver under me with a covered hole, so to collect any leakage, you feel like you're going to go everywhere, but you're not, then they let the stuff come back out of the tube when they unlocked it so it could come out naturally. That's what I had done after my surgery, when they thought the anastomsis was stricting and I had a blockage. The stuff is water soluable incase there are any leaks.

I always find these reversals so interesting because my father has a urostomy, had bladder ca 1994 and my mother had a colostomy then a ressection for an illeostomy, none of them had/have ever been reversed.

Good luck:wave:

Thank you ALL for your support and for the tips. Just a quick hello for now...off to celebrate the 4th!

Take care,
Cats

Thanks all for the advice! I had the test today and it went just as you all predicted. I was SO glad that I had a pad on because I did leak some out during the drive home...just got some more out too. I will get the results tomorrow, but I expect that all is well. Had my pre-ops today...

Hope all is well,
Take care and thanks for the great advice!
cats

Wishing you the best of luck for the results. When's your reversal ?

Reading this thread it strikes me that I really cannot remember what it was like to sit and poop the old fashioned way.

FINALLY stopped passing stuff from my bum yesterday! That solution managed to really clean me out...lots of mucous, etc. I am a little worried because I had very little control of it passing...what does that say for Thursday's reversal??? Oh well...we'll see how it goes.

Thanks again to you all for the tips! I'll let you know when I am back on my feet!

Take care,
Cats

I am not sure if you will be able to catch the reply before you go for the reversal.

I also experience the same thing. It almost cleaned me out and I had absolutely no control over it. There is one advantage of cleaning, you will have less problems in cleaning for surgery. I felt that way, as this liquid cleaned me out, I had absoluely no problem with half-lytely and anema while cleaning for surgery.

As for control, I also did not have any control. I also didn't have any control when diarrhea kind of thing started after reversal. I soild the hospital bed three times. Well I put all my energy after that in controlling and I was able to control for enough time to get up from bed, pull power plug of my IVs and walk to bathroom to empty myself.

The control will slowly come back depending on the whatever muscles are left there.

Thanks! nothing moving yet. Surgeon said they had a hard time reconnecting, so it will be a while before he'll let me eat, due to swelling. Right now i get 1 oz. of water per hour. He did clip out some small adhesions - 'like spider webs' I think i'll be here for a while:yawn: :yawn:

he did a colonoscopy too, which was clear! Yeah.

blod presure is pretty lw (81/52)...otherwise i am doing well. thanks for al the support!
sory for typos--thiis touch scren isn't great.

take care