Can anyone without a gall bladder chime in?

[seamonkey]

Does anyone know if not having a gall bladder affects how the liver processes your meds? I take my klonopin and geodon around 5 since I have to take the geodon with food. I take seroquel for sleep and zonegran for migraines when I'm ready for bed. I had previously been on 300mgs of seroquel.

I had gall bladder surgery on 6/15 and dropped about 15 lbs and started over sleeping so we lowered my seroquel to 200mgs. My pdoc writes the prescription as 1-2 100mgs a night as needed.

Before my surgery, I was a 4am gym person. Now I am barely dragging it out bed in time to walk the dogs and make it to work.

I'm also having issues with my blood work and elevated amylase, but we are waiting for the results of my abdominal ultrasound

[bpladybug]

well, I don't have a gall bladder myself

the main difference I notice is I am more likely to get diarrhea

I was not on this many meds, and not yet on Seroquel when I had my surgery.

I don't know of any Seroquel takers who can get up and exercize at 4 or 5 in the morning.

Well, you are the first I guess.

My liver numbers have been somewhat elevated for years, since I took Depakote for four years.

My doctors watch it but as it is stable and not trending up there is not yet a lot of concern about it.

[tothepointe]

I had my gallbladder out on 2/20 this year. I didn't really notice any difference in the way my meds were metabolized but I did notice that many small symptoms I thought were meds went away. I would imagine with your gall bladder removed and your common bile duct not being periodically blocked that the function of your liver might have improved but maybe something was damaged in the surgery if your liver enzymes are raised. Mine were elevated with mild jaundice + hepatic confusion before the surgery so out was an improvement over in.

It sounds like a liver problem not so much of a lack of GB. You might have a bile duct leak?

[seamonkey]

tothepointe, they are suspecting pancreas issues, not liver. My liver enzymes were fine, but my amylase is elevated. They made me come back 3 times to get it rechecked and did an abdominal ultrasound and more blood work.

The nurse called this morning and said the amylase is still elevated and they want me to see a gastro. I asked about the ultrasound and she was like WHAT ultrasound?

BPladybug, yup. I was on 300mgs of seroquel before my surgery and popped up every morning at 4am to go to the gym, but my p-doc also thinks I should donate my body to science

[Jen78]

Im probably no help since my gb was taken out almost 9 years ago. But ive since developed lower and upper,GI problems so ive always wondered if my meds get metabolized properly

[melissaw72]

To answer your question, the best advice I have is to go to www.ask.com and ask "is the gallbladder related to how the liver metabolizes medications" ... I could not find any direct answers to your question. There were connections between the 2 but I couldn't find anything about metabolizing medications in the articles I read.

[tothepointe]

tothepointe, they are suspecting pancreas issues, not liver. My liver enzymes were fine, but my amylase is elevated. They made me come back 3 times to get it rechecked and did an abdominal ultrasound and more blood work.

Sorry when I read amylase I automatically though AST but yes amylase is one of the pancreatic enzymes. Your GB/Liver/Pancreas are all connected by ducts and one of them might be damaged/blocked or that was your problem in the first place not your GB. Its not unheard of to have pancreatitis before or after a GB removal so I'd be aware of the signs and symptoms of that to look out for. Your pancreas not being at 100% can definitely affect your energy and the pancreas controls the uptake and release of glycogen through insulin and glucagon.

I'd google "Postcholecystectomy Syndrome" and see if anything there fits.