Doctor Not Helping with Severe Abdominal Pain

As a child growing up in a medical family (I have a large family, we have several doctors and you can't swing a cat without hitting a nurse or med-field scientist)... TRUST ME. no one, but no one gets more "2nd" (aka 3rd, 9th, 20th) opinions than doctors themselves. Oy. They know all the things it COULD be, you see... and worse know half the personalities in the field... so it goes from dx'ing themselves, to having their colleague in the office take a look, to the specialist they know from 'x', to the top guy/gal in the state... all the way to Johns Hopkins/ Mayo, you name it... when they're either not satisfied with the answer, or have decided to seek out the "best". It can get downright amusing to be watching this from the sidelines.

MANY doctors can & do get affronted and snippy when their patients 2nd guess them. (Even when they've just seen 4 people last week about "y"... my grandfather used to joke he took 2 oaths, the hippocratic and hypocritic). <grinning> So too darn bad. At the end of the day you go home to your family and they go home to theirs. Take care of you and your own, and they can take care of theirs. So NEVER worry about offending a doc. If they get proved right, the get to gloat in secret and if they get proved wrong it's interesting. And anyone who isn't confidant enough in their own dx to have someone else *good* to look-see, you don't want to be seeing them anyway.

For a 2nd opinion I would highly suggest getting not a 2nd OB opinion, but an Internist.

(As a NON-doctor) it strikes me that while the symptoms triggered with both pregnancies, and have become chronic with the 2nd... it seems a stretch to assume that the problem is part of the reproductive tract. It COULD be, of course (endometriosis, a cyst, a nerve grown the wrong way)... but everything gets shoved around while we're preggo, organs/nerves/major blood vessels get rather rudely elbowed out of the way. Add in massive hormones (which can trigger all kinds of things), and "referred pain" and you've got yourself a puzzle. Now... while there are general internists, most specialize these days into subsets of gasteroenterology/ cardiology/ neurology/ endocrinology/ etc. (I think there are 13 subspecialties, if I'm remembering correctly) What I would recommend doing is to call up your favorite hospital, ask for their doctor referral line (or get one from your GP) for an internist to help dx severe abdominal pain.

My dear. Your pain sounds awful. Living with pain like that is not normal; it means that something is seriously wrong in the body. You owe it to yourself and your family not to "live with the pain." Resolve yourself that you are going to have to be your own medical advocate on this one, and get motivated to start the research, contact the doctors, and keep after this until you get answers. Here is a contact for finding an endometriosis specialist in your area. http://www.endo-resolved.com/specialist.html Even if these docs don't live near you, call some up and ask if they do have recommendations for someone in your area. You are going to have to take charge on this one. But you should not suffer like this. Good luck.

Great advice so far, A.. I can't imagine being in so much pain, esp. with babies. If you don't want to ask the ob/gyn directly for the referral, perhaps his office staff or nurse could tell you which other ob/gyns or internists he refers patients to. I also like the idea of doing your own research such as calling a local hospital to ask for a referral or to speak with a nurse on the floor who has experience with the different doctors. You could also do research online, and then depending on your insurance, ask your doctor for a referral to that person. I found a great ob/gyn when I moved to a new area by asking the nurses at the maternity ward's main desk for a referral. They said she was fairly new there but that they really liked the decisions she made. I didn't think there was a much better endorsement than that. Best wishes for your finding the road to recovery very soon. Blessings.

When I was going through chemo after the birth of my 2nd child, my Oncologist wanted to move from chemo to radiation. The Radiation Oncologist said he didn't agree. I went to my Oncologist, as hard as it was and asked for referrals on other opinions. He sent me to 2 Lymphoma specialists out of state that he regarded well. I chose not to do radiation after getting 3 opinions.

A good doctor really won't mind you getting other opinions. If they can't get past that, you should be seeing another physician anyhow.

Ask your friends, ask your colleagues (if you're working), call the hospital and ask their recommendation on a good OB/GYN (or ask your FP who they respect).

After 9 years of pharmaceutical sales experience, I can tell you that there are some really good doctors out there and some who aren't so good. They're all smart, but not all want to be as good as possible.

Good luck! I hope you get this all resolved soon!

Forget about offending, any good doctor would understand (even if they do not like it) that 2nd, 3rd opinions help puts our minds at ease as well as they might just notice something that the other ond did not see.

If they think it is scar tissue I am not sure why they did not just clean it up right away. Scar tissue is can be bad news if inside by your organs. My hubby had scar tissue that wrapped itself around his intestines which eventually made it so food could not pass through and part of his intestines died and had to be removed. This happened almost 12 years after his colon surgery, and the scar tissue was from his colon, they only way they knew it was the scar tissues was to just to exploratory surgery... but it saved his life in the end. Scar tissue on the inside is not a good thing, it never goes away and it keeps growing if attached but it always seems to be over looked or ignored by doctors, the only way to clean it up is surgery.

I struggle with ovarian cysts ever 3 months, thankfully they are filled with liquid instead of cancer, they are painful but they can do a ultrasound to see it and usually put me on pain killers for a few days when they burst. I would not take any medication unless diagnosed and have proof of what is wrong. Did the OB/GYN do an ultrasound? That is one a good way to see if they can find anything in the feminine area with out doing surgery on you, it is a start. In the end they may just need to do surgery to get to the bottom of it but get another opinion... also if the OB/GYN thinks it is something ask what he/she needs to be done to get diagnosed, blood work, surgery, etc for what they suggest you might have.

Don't hesitate. Get a second opinion.......or even a third. Remember these doctors are being paid. They are employed by you. I doubt they will care, but if their egos are bruised that is their thing, not yours. Every doctor can't know everything. They are just human beings. Find the right one.

Please, don't worry about offending the doctors-they are professionals, and though you might be embarrassed, they probably won't be at all. Go get a second opinion, get the larposcopy, get whatever you need to get to feel better. The hormone removal sounds like a really terrible idea to me, but I'm not a doctor. I've been trying like hell to GET MORE of those hormones, because without them you have other problems. All I can tell you, really, is that after you have your kids, the organs that they liked to bounce up and down on are slightly displaced inside your body. I don't know if they did a c-section on you the second time around, but even if they didn't, something may be just slightly out of place and causing you discomfort. If you did have a c-section, it probably left more scar tissue, or even if you had a natural birth for that matter, some scarring from stretching will occur. That damn scar tissue can really hurt you-it did me, believe it. You are going to have to weigh the possibility of surgery to alleviate the pain (if it is neccessary) against your heart condition. I wish you the best.

I did, and the problem was in fact endometriosis. I suffered for years in pain until that diagnosis was made, then suffered another 17 years of pain between surgeries and other treatments to deal with it.

The endometriosis was cured by another pregnancy, 20 years after the first.

The bleeding at the drop of the hat, the pain... it really does sound like cysts/fibroids/endometriosis. I just wouldn't discount it so readily.

Ask for the referral, find a doc you're comfortable with, but get them to look inside somehow. Don't suffer for the next 20 years in pain. Do not worry about offending someone - this is your pain, your body, and your life. Ask for the second opinion - find out what's going on sooner rather than later.

Forget about offending anyone. What would you do if this was your child in this case? Push and shove to get the care you need. Hard if you have to. We push for our children so hard but when it comes to taking care or ourselves, we tend to back off. Get the laparoscopy done. I agree with you that drugs should be after to help solve the problem not a wait and see.