"Slow" liver according to my functional medicine doc. Anyone else?

[testingwithfire]

Hi all, brand new to this community.

57 year old woman in menopause as of this year or last. My liver has not enjoyed the change, apparently, and is on partial strike in terms of bile secretion / production.

Symptoms and treatment plan below if you're interested in reading. But I'm really here just to see if anyone else has had similar symptoms without having full-on cirrhosis or gallbladder disease.

If my description sounds like what you have, how are you dealing with it?

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I saw a functional medicine doctor on Monday and her diagnosis: slow / insufficient bile secretion, with a huge chain of consequences, including what looks like pancreatic insufficiency.

My symptoms and related conditions:

* Intolerance to dietary fat: gas, fatigue after eating, tiny "constipated" poops. All of this eases up if I minimize dietary fat

* Cholesterol over 280, and high amylase and lipase as well. The latter two, my doctor tells me, has to do with the pancreas not knowing quite what to do

* Extremely dry skin and hair, including peeling skin on feet

* Overall malnutrition despite a diet more than adequate in protein and fat. My heart muscle has been adversely affected and I have lost muscle mass all over my body.

Thank God I'm not dealing with any blood sugar issues or other conditions. I thought I was hypothyroid due to one low free T3 reading, but my doctor doesn't think that's the issue (and I agree with her explanation).

My doctor prescribed milk thistle, a methylated multivitamin, Soria Composor hepavesical complex, red rice starch for the cholesterol, and a host of other things to help get my liver to go back to work.

She has also advised me to go from a high fat keto-ish diet to a plant-based diet, and I'll be working with a nutritionist on that part. I'll still be eating a sufficient amount of animal protein, but it needs to be lean.

[AyrshireK]

From your symptoms it really sounds like you need to see a conventional, medical tests for a full and thorough physical exam with proper screening, blood tests and scans. In the UK you'd be advised against taking milk thistle and so called alternative and herbal remedies especially when you don't know what is actually going on with your liver.

Have you had screening that has staged your liver condition?

Katie

[LeiL]

I also sought advice from a Functional Medicine Physician who once practiced traditional medicine at Walter Reed Medical Hospital in Maryland. I’m also having menopausal/thyroid issues which affects my liver. Her first recommendation was to take a Digestive Enzyme, B Complex, as well as NAC for my issues. She also did a complete battery of hormone tests and I have very high Testosterone. I then went to a Endocrinologist who placed me on Birth Control Pills for 3 weeks. High Testosterone can have very adverse effects on your Liver. If you haven’t had your hormones tested I strongly recommend. The BCPs lowered the testosterone from 99 to 40. I haven’t taken BCPs since I was 22 to now taking them 42 years later.

[Richard-Allen]

This is just a thought, has anyone mentioned possible Gall stones to you? These little devils can often escape from the gall bladder and become stuck in the common bile duct.

These stones can often present mysterious symptoms. Because the bile from the liver is unable to flow properly, it can become backed up. This can then cause certain liver enzymes to begin to rise and cause higher-than-normal blood test results.

This can often give a doctor a false idea of what is happening. So, one day you go to the doctor’s and he/she runs a liver function test. The results come back on the high side. So the doctor repeats the test six weeks later, only this time the results all come back as normal. The doctor thinks this was just a possible infection that has now cleared up and sent you on your way.

What can be happening is that the bile duct becomes blocked by a stone, which is stopping the flow of bile from the liver. This stone can then become dislodged later on and the bile can once more flow again. A few weeks later and the stone can become stuck again and so on.

Many people who have had their gallbladders removed, can still have left-over stones that were hiding elsewhere.

Most doctors will want to go looking for the cause of this blockage, by ruling certain things out, what is left is normally the cause. So, ruling out possible gallstones should be one of the things they would be looking for,

Good luck.

Richard

Gallbladder showing Gallstones

[testingwithfire in reply to Richard-Allen]

I've had one doctor recommend an abdominal TAC, which I guess is more thorough than an abdominal ultrasound?

I had an abdominal ultrasound earlier this year and it didn't show very much that could be considered a problem.