Vicodin and Ileostomy - Safe or Risky? Experiences?

I am 1 year post-op after my ileostomy surgery I had performed at the Mayo Clinic. I still have daily pain from the hernia involved - most days are manageable but some days are very painful. After my surgery, the Mayo Clinic told me I cannot take Vicodin for pain management because it will cause a blockage. I had a particularly painful weekend so I saw my local GP doctor this week and brought up this issue. He sees no reason I cannot take Vicodin - the only side effect might be a "slowing down" of the stool (which wouldn't be a bad thing) but didn't think it would cause a blockage and gave me a script for it.

My question is: Has anybody out there used Vicodin successfully with a colostomy/ileostomy or are there any incidents of it indeed causing a blockage?

Any help on this would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks.

Doug

Hi Graph, my surgeon told me to take a stool softener if I took any narcotics for pain.  He was very "matter-of-fact" about it.  Good luck.

Mike

Thank you very much for your response, Mike. When I discussed this with my GP, he didn't seem to think it was an issue. Remembering what the Mayo Clinic told me and your response, I believe I will call my GP's doctor's office tomorrow and press the issue. The last thing I want is a blockage!

Thanks again, Mike!

I can't speak to your present condition, but having had an ileostomy and taking Vicodin, I've never had any blockages of any kind. I take it for a lifetime of chronic pain and take between 2 to 3 per day as needed. I no longer have my ileostomy as I had a reversal last Dec, but I still take the Vicodin and it does nothing to cause constipation for me either. I have great respect for the Mayo Clinic, but this time perhaps they are overly cautious when maybe they don't need to be. I would take the Vicodin if you need it for pain.

I am happy to report that I took a chance with Vicodin and have not had any problems. Since my original posting, I have used it 3 times (of course I wouldn't make a habit of it) and never had any issues. Thank you all for your replies and advice.

Doug

Getting Support in the Ostomy Community with LeeAnne Hayden | Hollister

Hey Doug, thanks for sharing the good news.  Sometimes we offer suggestions and never hear back.  We hope the advice was beneficial but we're not sure.  Your message makes it all good for all of us.

Sincerely,

Mike

You are welcome, Mike, for my reply.

A good friend of mine's father had colon cancer many years ago and subsequent colostomy. He told me one of the most important things I can do now that I've had my surgery is to join a support group. His support group meets monthly and they have speakers come and discuss various topics and report on the latest information and products relating to living "our style". When I had my surgery, one of the first things I asked was for info about local support groups. The dr. looked at me like, "Huh?" There are no support groups in my area?! So I appreciate this forum and all the information I have learned. I have learned more here than from doctors (and it doesn't cost as much).

So I truly appreciate anybody posting information on this site to help others, and if I can help anyone else with a situation I've been through, I will not hesitate to pass my information along.

Thanks to everyone here.

Doug

Hi Doug. Glad to hear things worked out with the Vicodin. There's always some anxiety in taking a new drug, particularly when the side effects can be severe; but a less stressful approach might be to start with smaller dosages and build up to a level you can tolerate. When dealing with narcotics, recommended adult dosages should not necessarily be seen as "one size fits all". Continued good luck!

PB

I was taking Percocet for pain, an opioid like Vicodin, after my surgery. During the holidays, I ate a little more than I should have and wound up in the ER with a blockage. A 5-day hospital stay attributed to constipation from the Percocet and overeating. I'm really careful now and avoid that stuff as much as possible. Just sayin'.

Hi Doug! I'm too have an ileostomy with a hernia. About your concern about taking Vicodin, I have chronic pain from an accident I was in long before the ileostomy. I currently take oxycodone and I've never had a problem with blockage or flow and my medicine is stronger. Do you have a hernia belt? If not, ask about one, my insurance paid for mine and it does help. I hope this information helps you. Good luck!

Thanks for your reply, Klark. Wow! 5 days! Hope you are doing better now. I have not used Vicodin since my above posting and, even though I had no problems at that time, I am still a little skittish about using it. I am very conscious about my eating habits and try to adhere to the rule of eating small amounts more frequently throughout the day. I have found that larger meals are just too painful for me - seems to put too much pressure on my abdomen.

- Doug

Thanks for your reply, heartoobig. A week before last Christmas (2014), I woke up to the most excruciating pain I've ever had in my life. I know I passed out at least twice (probably more), and my daughter (thankfully home from college) found me on the bathroom floor in an ocean of sweat. She was able to get me to the hospital. Turns out my hernia had gotten worse, and 8 inches of my small intestine had pushed out through the hole and had gotten kinked, so I had to have immediate emergency surgery. The surgeon told me once he got in there he found the hernia was so large he could put his fist through it. He also said there was a lot of scarred tissue left over from my initial surgery that he cut out. Since he is not a specialist in this type of surgery, he only sewed things back up and tried to tighten up around my stoma. He said the proper way to "fix" my problem would probably be to move the stoma to a different location and repair the old hernia with mesh - a major and messy operation.

I fear that this will recur - the surgeon told me there is a high probability that it will at some point - so I have worn a hernia belt ever since. Though I've had a lot of pain since and my recovery has been slow, I have refrained from using narcotics. After the pain I experienced with this last incident, I am now hypersensitive to a blockage.

-Doug

I have an ileostomy since 2010. I have scleroderma and a subtotal colectomy went septic. I would not use Vic's even before that surgery due to the constipation effect...........fast forward - still don't like to take Vic's as it truly slows down your gut which is a symptom of SC anyway -

READY TO LAUGH NOW............back in Sept 2014 I had a molar removed - took painkillers for 30 days......Jan 2015 - whole Vic's started passing through my stoma into my bag - no joke - by April 2015 I had counted 27 pills that I saw pass through my bag.....WTF where the heck were they hiding....

Got a few different doctor opinions on it but my advice is if you HAVE to take one, drink a lot of water and move around a lot

What a coincidence, moonshine, I have to have a molar removed on Monday. The oral surgeon said he would prescribe Vicodin for the pain. I told him of my situation and he said he would just recommend ibuprofen instead. Not sure how painful the tooth extraction will be, but I am thinking about maybe asking for a low dosage of Vicodin.

Weird that your pills were passing through whole! And the quantity?

I was going to start a topic very similar to this, but without trying to hijack the original poster's thread, I figured what I have to ask is right in line with what everyone else is saying.

My issue is that prior to my ileostomy surgery, I was able to take various prescription narcotics with no slowing effect on my bowel (I was connected directly small bowel to rectal stump before the surgery and my system was running fast - 30+ trips to the bathroom per day). I even tried taking straight codeine (90mg I believe) to try and get the side effect of slowing my bowel down, with no success.

I take narcotics regularly to deal with primarily chronic back pain. Even since I got my ileostomy, I can only take doses 1/5th the amount and I must keep them spaced nearly 5 hours apart. If I don't, I experience exactly what the poster's doctor said: I have a "virtual blockage". I can't even take small doses of codeine, like one would get in a prescribed cough medicine (at least here in Canada).

I already experience partial blockages multiple times a year, likely from a restricted bowel, scar tissue, adhesions, and then some little piece of food that can't get through. Some blockages, despite the pain, I try to endure at home until they clear on their own. I typically stop eating and drinking and it things work their way through. Other times, the pain/cramps hurt too much and the only drug I can safely take is Acetaminophen (I can't take Ibuprofen as I have developed Kidney Disease as a result of multiple dehydration episodes causing acute renal failure), which has zero effect with such severe pain. In these cases, I end up at the hospital where I can get higher doses of narcotics (morphine) pumped in through an IV without the effects on my bowels. I've also had to get my stomach pumped on a few occasions to help relieve some of the top pressure, whereas other times I've vomited so much from the pain, there would be nothing left to pump out.

Sorry, long back story to get to the question of: For those of you who do experience virtual blockages from taking specific narcotics, have you found anything you can take at home for acute pain and even for chronic pain? As I've been on hydromorphone (a form of morphine that is quick acting) for 7 years, the small dose I take has become as effective as an Advil (my body's become tolerant to it so its effectiveness is diminished significantly). I only take 6mg, 4 times a day, but I cannot increase that to anything useful nor increase the frequency without causing my bowel to slow down way too much. I've also tried Fentanyl patches, but despite being subdermal in its delivery system, it affects my bowels.

I have to admit, I am afraid to try anything else as the pain I get from blockages (real or narcotic created) is very unpleasant. Also, the last thing I want to do is take a medication for pain (as 9 out of 10 times it's pain from a blockage) and make the blockage feel even worse. I'm also afraid of the stool softener, as my hydration is something I battle with daily, so if a stool softener made my ostomy output increase drastically, that would end up hospitalizing me.

I may sound like a drug addict, but all I want is a narcotic that I can take at home to deal with times I have greater pain.