Posted 6/27/2009 3:00 PM (GMT 0)
I did not go back on the 6MP.
When I got the pancreatitis I happened to just be getting a flare at the same time, so I didn't even know I had pancreatitis, I just thought this flare was different. I would get this horrible pain up really high in my stomach right in the center, like just under my rib cage. The pain would come on all of a sudden and I would feel like I couldn't breath. It would eventually fade away, like maybe after 30-45 minutes, however after it left I still had this horrible dull achy pain where the next day it would even hurt to just walk around. On top of that I stated to lose my appetite and was very nauseous. Finally, one night after I slept most the day and ate next to nothing, I ended up drinking some gatorade before bed and about an hour or two later I was vomitting it all up. From there my sister took me to the hospital, where I vomitted yet again (but this time all that was in my stomach was a whole lot of bile or stomach acid), and from there they said my amylase and lipase were elevated. Apparently my levels were higher than normal, but not even in the thousands. Either way, whatever the levels were, it was horribly, horribly painful. I mean the pain from the pancreatitis was ten times worse than any pain I had from the UC.
The issue in my situation is that often times when people get pancreatitis from 6MP they get it after being on the medication for just a few weeks. My symptoms didn't show up till about 8 months of being on it. The other thing my doctor said is that Asacol can also cause pancrea***, and I was on both medications at the time. So they are a little confused by my situation, yet confident enough to not put me back on either medication. If you start to have pancreatitis, you will notice, as the pain is unbearable and you will get nauseous and start vomitting. Perhaps your doctor is not attributing your elevated levels to the 6MP and that is why he/she put you back on it? When I was in the hospital, to treat the pancretitis, they don't let you eat or drink anything until your levels return to normal, which mine did within a few days. Were you treated similarly?