Is it possible to live without gallbladder

Gone is my morning sensitivity to all foods except cereal, and my painful gas and bloating. Now comes the most daunting part of recovery from this surgery: acclimating my digestive system to life without a gallbladder.

The gallbladder is an incredibly underrated organ. People assume it is useless and not necessary to survival, similar to the appendix. While we can live without a gallbladder, its purpose is to break down fats with bile. Without a place to store the bile, it flows from the liver directly to the small intestines and makes fatty foods harder to digest. I chose peanut butter to test how my new gallbladder-less digestive system would handle fats.

Ten minutes later, I felt the familiar lower abdominal discomfort of oncoming diarrhea. I rushed to the bathroom as fast as possible for someone with muscular dystrophy and abdominal incisions. To quote J. Muscular dystrophy makes any illness more exhausting. Colds can last weeks and end in a hospital stay. Infections take twice as long to heal. It takes longer to recover from open surgery.

You may need to stay in hospital for 3 to 5 days and it could be 6 to 8 weeks before you're feeling back to normal. Find out more about recovering from gallbladder removal surgery. Your liver will still make enough bile to digest your food, but instead of being stored in the gallbladder, it drips continuously into your digestive system.

You may have been advised to eat a special diet before surgery, but this doesn't need to be continued afterwards. Instead, you should aim to have a generally healthy, balanced diet. Some people experience problems such as bloating or diarrhoea after surgery, although this usually improves within a few weeks.

If you notice certain foods or drinks trigger these symptoms, you may wish to avoid them in the future. Gallbladder surgery is the only treatment for problematic gallstones that puts an immediate end to excruciating gallbladder attacks and effectively removes the potentially life-threatening health complications they can trigger.

Advances in minimally invasive surgical techniques have made it possible to perform most cholecystectomies laparoscopically, rather than with a conventional open approach. Unlike an open cholecystectomy, which accesses your gallbladder through one large incision, laparoscopic gallbladder surgery uses four tiny incisions, specialized tools, and a high-definition camera to access the area with minimal tissue trauma.

Because the laparoscopic method is less disruptive than open surgery, it comes with a smaller risk of complications, a faster, less painful recovery, and minimal scarring. Serrano has also developed an even more advanced approach to gallbladder removal: the ultra-minimally invasive UMI cholecystectomy.

By combining laparoscopy and robotics, this exceptionally precise, high-tech procedure provides a superior cosmetic outcome with less risk. After gallbladder surgery, your liver continues to produce enough bile to digest the fats in your diet.

As your small intestine gets used to the direct flow of bile from your liver, you may experience loose, watery stools for a few weeks or even a few months. Simply avoid greasy and fatty meals that contain more than 3 grams of fat per serving. Check the ingredients of packed food like processed meats, sauces, dairy products, etc which at times contain more fat than you expect. Different food varieties to approach with balance include — beef, sausage, chips, daily product full-fat milk, cheese, cream, etc , fried foods, and food that contains a good number of vegetables, peanut, olive, canola oil.

Avoid eating most of your food throughout 3 large meals. Try and make a diet plan with 6 small meals that include to calories all at once. Try to incorporate lean meats like fish, chicken without skin, etc.

You can also include fresh juices and green vegetables in your meals. Avoid taking high-fibre meals after gallbladder removal surgery , it can create gas, bloating, pain in the stomach, and diarrhea. Simply start with more modest amounts, and progressively increment your portions as you sort out what your body can deal with.

Food or beverages that include caffeine such as tea and coffee can increase create problems like gas, bulging, and pain in the stomach. Since caffeine produces stomach acid and it can quickly make your stomach empty more than expected.

In the absence of concentrated bile to break down stomach substances moved into the small intestine; the common symptom of gallbladder removal can be exasperated.

Likewise, with your fibre consumption, you simply need to restrict caffeine intake while you recuperate from the surgery. You can progressively begin adding more to your eating regimen as your body changes.