Abdominal Pain with onset of off period

[sutensera]

I've been on C//L for close to 3 years now, Lately I am experiencing significant abdominal pain when the off period starts. It subsides after 30 min or so after taking my medication.

What could be the reason? Have others had similar experiences? Any simple home remedy to ease the pain (don't want to take more medication)?

Any insights will be helpful

[Hikoi]

is it a dystonia?

[Enidah]

I used to have terrible pain in my abdomen during off periods. It often made my off times quite hellish. I also developed dysphagia, difficulty swallowing and found out from the ENT that I had acid indigestion that was backing up in my esophagus causing all sorts of problems and causing the stomach pain. It all started when I took Advil one day and I swear it ate a hole in my stomach. So I take omniprazole twice a day and if I need to Tums kind of antacids. I also raised the head of my bed a few inches and I try to be careful to not overeat before bed. This has felt like I had something in my throat or somebody was pressing on it. I seldom have that now. Apparently that's common also and can even change your voice if the acid reaches your vocal cords too often. I hope this helps you. Off times are bad enough without having stomach pain added to them...too much folks, it's just too much.

[johntPM]

sutensera,

Does this happen once on every dose? Does it occur at the same time every day? What times are you eating? What is your drug regimen (drug, dose, time)?

On the limited information that you've given, it seems possible that you are under-medicated. It could be that the pain would be avoided by not going "off", by staying "on" all the time.

Take your drugs as normal for 3 days to create a baseline. What can you measure? Perhaps the duration of the pain or its intensity. Document.

A simple test would be to be to focus on just one dose, the one that comes before the pain; and, bring forward that one dose by 10 minutes, keeping all the others unchanged. The hope is that this will be long enough for the levodopa to be absorped before you go "off".

The interval to the next dose is 10 minutes longer than normal, so it is possible that this will give a worse than normal episode. If this is a problem, do not repeat the test. Otherwise, repeat for about 3 days to get a feel for the natural variability from one day to the next.

You should see your doctor for a longer term fix.

John

[Gallowglass]

I had something like that. It was solved by chewing gum whenever it happened plus losing weight. I would avoid Ppi’S like Omeprazole. It’s too hard to get off them and they can have bad side effects over time. I was told the problem is due to vagal neuropathy.

[brauncs]

I have been on Omeprazole for 30 years or so without any side effects. I was diagnosed with GERD and developed Barretts esophagus, which is the next step towards throat cancer, and taking the Omeprazole allowed my throat to heal itself so about 5 years ago my last biopsy showed no more Barretts. I have nothing but good things to say about Omeprazole.

As far as your abdomen is concerened I would guess it's unrelated to your dopamine therapy but if you find out it is you can always take your C/L sublingually and avoid your digestive tract altogether.

Good Luck

[brauncs in reply to brauncs]

Correction. I have been on Omeprazole 20 years, not 30. I take digestive enzymes to make-up for the loss from the medication.