colonoscopy

[Hearty-cuisine]

I’ve had a colonoscopy but it was far more painful than the one I had a few years ago. The bowel prep was awful. I followed instructions but I was still loosing fluid when I went for appointment. People don’t usually talk about their experience of a colonoscopy so just wondering if what experienced was a usual part of having the procedure?

[Coachmanbythesea]

Hi, I’ve only had one colonoscopy so far. My experience with the prep wasn’t a good one! Horrendous pain for 2-3 hours along with throwing up twice. That said, the end result was good and I was completely cleared out. The procedure was painless, I think the gas/air they give really helped. I was more interested in seeing my insides on the screen! Couple of polyps which were removed and diverticulosis of the sigmoid colon was found.

It can be a thoroughly unpleasant experience but a necessary evil to get the right diagnosis.

[Allot]

Hi I’ve had 3 colonoscopies over a few years two privately which were uncomfortable but not painful and one with NHS which was horrendous!!! So painful I ended up crying and had to stop. I really think the experience depends who does it. The NHS experience felt like I was on a conveyor belt with a pieceworker.

[Boxroad in reply to Allot]

I can echo that my first was private and second NHS was not nice, I think it’s about the time they have as well, and with the private we sat down and discussed what was found, nhs said found a polyp took it out and think you have been constipated, when I looked at my notes on my surgery web site, they said they found internal haemorrhoids and one external, the private one I was in the hospital for three hours, the NHS I was back in car within an hour

[Bijli]

Hi, I have had 2 failed colonscopies in recently. First one was a surprise as in the details they don't mention nappies, so I ended up using hand towels and undies to keep it in place both of which had to be thrown away. When I got there I asked for a nappy and cleaning facilities, I was given foam spray and that there were plenty of paper hand towels in the toilet. When they tried to carry out procedure I was too dirty so failed. When I got home I ordered online packs of nappies for next day delivery as I could not venture out. Incontinence continued for four days after. The second colonscopy I was better prepared although it was a fail. They did take out a rectal polyp and fixed with 5 metal clamps. I also had incontinence after the second one.

So I think that the hospitalsite should provide such information to at least make sure that the patient feels some dignity and security.

In fact it was a surprise to find that a ward of this nature had no showering facilities.

Glad I have some nappies left as I have further preps coming up.

God bless B XXX

[laurajn087]

Hi. I had an incomplete colonoscopy last week, as the camera could not get round the bend in my colon. I have got to have another one next Sunday using a paediatric camera which is smaller. I am gutted, to say the least, as it was such a horrendous, unpleasant, embarrassing, and painful experience. The sedation did not work either! The prep was awful too. If it doesn't work this time I'm not having a 3rd one!

[Meenie1]

I had colonoscopy last week and it was an ordeal. Took one hour and was very uncomfortable and painful at times.. It was the second time I had one and the experience was worse this time around..

[winfong]

Actually, people talk all the time about them on here. Try searching on "colonoscopy".

I've had about a half dozen of them. Piece of cake each time.

[Lclmlbls in reply to winfong]

I’m really very scared about having this procedure especially having read the reports on here. Do you have any tips to make this easier?

[winfong in reply to Lclmlbls]

Boy, I don't know. Lotta horror stories here. I guess that's just par for the course. People whose experience was just fine probably aren't going to get on and share that.

It does seem, though, like the anticipatory anxiety is the worst. If you look around, you'll probably find a fair amount of stories of people who were dreading it, the followed up later that it wasn't so bad.

Personally, I have IBS-C, so I don't mind getting all cleared out. In fact, I took it once just for that.

NOTE - I'm in the US, so it was private each time.

[Emaych61]

I’ve had four colonoscopies as an adult and in my opinion the prep is the worst part of it. There are different meds they use for this - the worst one I’ve had being Kleenprep. Not only was the stuff utterly disgusting but you have to down up to four litres of the stuff (yes - you did read that correctly, 4 litres(!!) , though it does depend on your bowel: not everyone needs that - sadly I did!!). I was really quite waspish to the consultant about that in the follow up appointment, suggesting that it should be a required part of a gastro cons training to have a spoonful of the meds they expect their patients to down in such quantities! They’ve used different ones with me since.

The first colonoscopy I had without sedation and it was awful! They couldn’t complete it, though that was because of my bowel (they couldn’t access the ascending colon - my bowel is difficult) not because of the discomfort I was experiencing. Since then I’ve had sedation and I’ve been fine. However, I do now have to have a guided scope in order to give the cons doing the procedure a chance of getting all the way round. Even with a paediatric scope (which has been tried in the past) their most experienced endoscopist couldn’t complete it.