How bad do your symptoms have to get before you go to the er?

I'd call your gastroenterologist office and see if they can get you in sooner, ask if there's any emergency spots left empty in the schedule (for unexpected worsening like yours), or if you could go in a cancelled appointment slot.

The ER doesn't know much about ulcerative colitis. They are good at treating life threatening concerns like dehydration (an issue with frequent diarrhea) and can hook you up to an IV drip, they are prepared for treating pain and bleeding and might give you pain relievers or steroids, and they can get you admitted to the hospital where you might see your gastroenterologist sooner. For many ulcerative colitis issues, they will refer you to your specialist.

My wife is a nurse, she just got home and checked me over and is worried about dehydration and anemia and is making me go in. I'm going to call the gastro and try and get the appointment moved up also.

I would try to force fluids before going. It is unlikely you bled enough in one week to be very anemic. The er will give you a bag of saline and a huge bill. if they scan or scope you, the bill will get even larger. they won't actually treat anything but the dehydration.

paying for that without insurance seems unwise. you will mostly be paying a lot to lower your anxiety. The money could be put towards copays for meds that will help you more.

good luck

It's probably good you're going. I never went to the ER, except when I had sepsis and I was having trouble breathing and standing. I had some flare ups where I was on the toilet 20x+ with tons of blood, getting no sleep, out of breath, blood count at 1 from immune suppressants - still didn't' go to the ER. People are pretty resilient actually. I don't recommend being how I am, but I am busy and cheap. Who is going to take care of my pets/bills if I am admitted? iPoop is right, sometimes a call to the GI can be a good option. They can prescribe something to rescue you, like prednisone, and you may avoid the hospital bill until you're insured again. It's only been a week...

when i'm too sick to dial 911, that's when i go

It's good you went! Good luck. I hope the bill isn't too terrible..

You did the right thing by going in. Some people would be surprised how fast you can go down hill in a bad flare. Hemoglobin can drop very quickly. I've been there so many times....more than I care to remember.

Hope you feel better soon!

I went to the ER a few weeks ago. They gave me really good pain meds, steroids and IV fluids, then admitted me to the hospital for three days. I wasn't responding to pred at home and was having 20+ BMs a day, couldn't sleep and was in terrible pain. I got scoped and sent home with Flagyl and Cipro. I felt like I was very close to remission and now a week after stopping the antibiotics, I'm super sick again. I'm thinking about going back to the ER. :(

That really sucks! I'm sorry.

OMG! I'm so sorry you had to deal with that. I would definitely call and complain to a supervisor. I've had some terrible experiences in ERs and with doctors in general. I hope there is another hospital nearby you can go to if you do not improve. November is a long time to wait while in a flare-up.

Yeah, they made it about the anemia and dehydration. They normalized the latter with fluids so they treated that as a non issue. My hemoglobin levels only dropped a point while I was there over night they said that level was stable.

I assumed they would just send me home, but this resident just handled everything terribly.

Here is a brief account of my discharge.

When he was giving me the discharge talk, I asked him if I am still bleeding a toilet bowl full of blood 10+ times a day won't my iron and hemoglobin levels just keep dropping and if that is the case, what would be some signs I'd need medical attention so I know when to come back?

He said you have nothing to worry about, if I were in danger of that my blood pressure would be low. My last bp there was 98 over 40 I told him and he said that was low and brushed it off. He told me I just have a stomach virus and to take the iron pills, and I'll be fine. I told him I have colitis not a virus. After that he ommited It could be something else, but it wasn't uc and it would probably go away.

There was way more, but that was all I feel like typing. It's actually worse than that made it sound.

My colonoscopy was done by the first gastroenterologist I had, he attends there. They had all the records from it.

My discharge papers just said unknown GI bleed.

Sorry for the wall of text, but I feel a little better after getting some of it out at least.

Post Edited (otheym432) : 10/19/2016 8:51:09 PM (GMT-6)

yeah, ER are not IBD treatment centers. The focus is generally on uncontrolled bleeding, crashing bp, and dehydration. Mostly ER stabilize and discharge for followup. Sometimes someone with 30+ really bloody bm or other comorbid conditions get admitted for IV sterroids.

It is easy for the bowl to get red colored for a small amount of blood. A serious bleed would have you be down to like 48 over unmeasurable. I lost so much blood in one afternoon that they had to give me immediate transfusions, and my upper bp was just below 50.

red water is unnerving, but it does sound like the bleeding is in the "typical for flare" range. funny the resident did not think the bleeding was from UC.