Post surgery cough

[Tighan]

Hi there, my husband is nearly 5 months post surgery and is generally recovering well, eating around 2000 calories a day, gaining weight slowly and sleeping well, all of which we’re very grateful for. The dumping syndrome happens much less frequently but he does have quite a severe cough which sometimes causes retching. The last couple of days he’s experiencing some dizziness and twice has woken because he’s feeling sick.

Does all that sound pretty normal? He’s got a CT scan tomorrow (planned from when he stopped FLOT) and we’re seeing the oncologist mid September. I guess I’m just worried! Some of the MDT have been quite pessimistic really all the way through as he was stage 4a and the margins on one side of the tumour were only 1mm so they think the cancer will come back.

We’re generally optimistic and positive people!

You’re thoughts and comments would be welcome

[SurreyGuy]

Hello. Just a thought but is your husband upright enough whilst sleeping? If not upright enough a small amount of liquid can find its way into the lungs. Its not enough to cause a cough at the time or enough to wake you but the total volume in the morning can cause coughing and of course if this happens night after night it perpetuates the cough. It may of course be something else but I used to have problems with this until I got the right wedge pillow (I also have an inflatable wedge pillow when not staying at home).

[Tighan in reply to SurreyGuy]

Thanks for your reply- he’s using a wedge pillow and we’ve been lent an electric bed so the mattress is at a slight angle. I’ll suggest he has a play around with the angle. He’s mostly coughing in the day, the nighttime coughing is a recent thing. He describes the cough as something tickling the back of his throat!

[Spikey]

At 2,000 kcal per day so soon after the operation, it's possible that he's eating too much. Regaining weight is not the top priority at this early stage. The cough may be caused by LPR (silent reflux), and the dizziness and nausea could be due to mild hypoglycemia caused by food passing too quickly into the digestive system. Both of which can be dealt with by changes to diet, medication and sleeping position.

[Tighan in reply to Spikey]

That’s a good point re mild hypoglycaemia- thanks