Question about Welchol and generally pill forms to control diarrhea...

(Hi -- I've never posted here so this might be the wrong place although it is accurate.)

For someone with surgery to their small intestine and who now has bile acid malabsorption, can anyone advise as to the best pill-form medicine to control diarrhea, for whom cholestyramine already works very well? (to complement Imodium).

Welchol seems like it doesn't work very well, or maybe there is a specific amount of time one must wait before eating, or a specific time period that it actually works during afterwards?

Maybe there is an expiration date on the pills? (do they last more than a year?)

Thanks!

Hello and welcome to the forum
It sounds as if you need to talk to your GI or surgeon...whoever is following you
If the diarrhea is related to the surgery then it is very important to keep in touch with your doctors.
Sometimes different medication tablets or preparations can interact with each other and could be harmful or ineffectual.
Sorry to hear you are having a difficult time
Feel better soon
Hugs
Trysha

My surgeon is no longer my doctor for quite a while. My regular GI doctor does not know very much. I posted here to see if anyone has any ideas!

I don't yet, but ask me again in a few weeks. Going in on Wednesday to have a resection where I will lose my ileal-cecal valve and a few cms more of bowel. When I asked how long I could expect to be off work, the nurse said it wasn't all surgery recovery but also my bowels figuring out their new normal and that the surgeon "has some tricks" depending on what happens.

I am quite lucky in that the surgeon and GIs talk to each other and work out of same hospitals.

I'm sorry you need to lose more of it.

I have read about stem cell transplanation in rats in 2005-6 to re-introduce bile acid absorption, but no further research seems to have been done. (ncbi . nlm . nih . gov / pubmed / 16256913)

I should probably post this elsewhere as well though... I am sure a lot of people are on Welchol..

if you tap into the search box at the top of the page you might get some results.I always ask different questions until I get the answers I'm looking for.Good Luck.but I agree with Trysha.You really should speak to a doctor.

agamemnus said:

I'm sorry you need to lose more of it.

I have read about stem cell transplanation in rats in 2005-6 to re-introduce bile acid absorption, but no further research seems to have been done. (ncbi . nlm . nih . gov / pubmed / 16256913)

I should probably post this elsewhere as well though... I am sure a lot of people are on Welchol..

Click to expand...

Hi. You could also try the Treatment section. People post there about different medicines they are on.

Thanks. I'll do that then.