NG Tube Experiences and Alternatives After Surgery

Hey all.

Just curious how common the stupid NG tube is when having one of our surgeries?

I have a temp Ileostomy and my system was asleep for two days following my surgery. They tried to NG tube me and I pulled that sucker out both times. Worst feeling I've experienced in life so far. Do not recommend...

SOOOOO I told them to go away and I spent the next 24 hours throwing up green bile and chewing on some gum until it things jump started. The strain on the stomach while throwing up was very painful but worth it. Because my stubbornness (and denying their professional advice) worked. (I rubbed it in their face after)

So.... If I decide to get the jpouch (which I'm leaning toward) I have two more surgeries. Is this "sleeping system" a pretty common thing? Cause if I have to get that tube forced down my throat again I'm not going to be happy. I feel like this should be a conversation had prior to agreeing to have the surgery. I'd probably die happy with UC if I knew this NG tube was a thing.

Anyone had surgery without the need for the tube? Asking for future Danno.

50/50 chance each time you have an abdominal surgery. After my colectomy, I was okay. After the reversal, I was not. I only ripped the tube out once though.

Imagine hearing that your organs fall asleep for the first time after having a crazy surgery? I'm like..... Nuh uh. Get outta here with that tube.

I didn't know about the 50/50 rate until after... I'm assuming it was in something I signed or I had tuned out if they were going over it verbally, but my one doctor would sidestep some of my questions if she thought I was asking because I was nervous... most of the time I was just curious. I begged to be sedated for the NG tube placement after I'd yanked it out the first time. I'm really allergic to one of the main meds they use to jump-start the stomach so they ran out of other options pretty quick.

I have had them too many times. Yes, I hate them like an ex-wife. That is the only thing I never want again.

My Ostomy Journey: Jearlean | Hollister

I was using a TENS unit one day (my shoulder still hurts a year after it got reconstructed, so instead of pain meds = TENS unit) and I realized if I positioned the electrode pads along certain points of my spine, my small intestine would start waking up. So I asked if they could just jump-start my system like a car battery...they didn't like that idea for some reason.

I would have my colon removed 10 times over vs an NG tube if I had the choice.

I heard that you have to be awake otherwise the tube can end up in an unwelcome place. The act of swallowing forces it to your stomach.

Yeah, it can puncture a lung if it goes down the wrong 'tube'. So they make you drink, drink, drink... it literally sounds like a college drinking game lol. The resident and nurse in training in front of me didn't fare well. My bad.

NG tube is very common with these surgeries. The doctor explained to me that anytime they go in messing with the intestines, they are very sensitive and can paralyze. It's called ileus. Ha, I was there puking up that green bile that you speak of, and I hated that tube, but the alternative was more painful. The house doctor almost killed me by not letting the nurse put one in one night, and I thought I was dying. I even had them call the preacher in, but he finally okayed the thing by the time I had a river of bile next to my bed. Poor nurses who had to clean that up and walk through it. My doctor's team was not too happy about that house doctor putting me through that suffering the next morning. I spent 30 days in that hospital with a horrible ileus. I kept complaining about that tube as it was more painful than the proctocolectomy and end ileostomy was. Finally, they sent me to a doctor there that put a G tube in me and took out the NG tube. The G tube is actually a feeding tube, but you can connect a bag to it and use a little lever to release the contents of the stomach so that all the bile could go into that and relieve your tummy. It was an experimental thing this doc came up with for ileus, and it was so much better than having that tube up my nose. So shortly after, I was sent home with it and a prescription for liquid erythromycin, which also helps ileus. I had to be fed by TPN for nutrition through my blood veins, so I had all this stuff at my house and doing it myself as they taught me. I got well pretty fast after that. It's good that you were able to manage, but ileus can kill you; it's nothing to mess around with. Almost everyone in the colorectal surgery floor was walking around with those NG tubes up their nose.

I have had six colorectal surgeries, four of them involved a new stoma. I only had the tube once and that was because there was a blockage immediately after one of the surgeries while still in the hospital. I think I had the tube in for a couple of days and yes, it is horrible. And yes, wide awake drinking water to draw it down.

Yuck, hate hate hate NG tubes and nasal feeding tubes and cameras down my throat. I'm a wimp and proud of it lol. Mine always come out when I'm being violently sick. Some doctors automatically put them in while having surgery, maybe more to do if they're expecting problems straight away. I have to be heavily sedated to have them done now. Last time they tried to get one down when I was awake, I went mental. I pulled the central line out I had in my neck and hit out at anyone that came near me. They had to get doctors and nurses from ICU to come and do their magic and knock me out, then took around 1 hour to patch me up enough to take me to ICU before having a few more hours of work on me to sort me out. Then heavily sedated for a week to stop me from doing anything else stupid. I can't remember anything about being like that. I'm not that type of person to be violent towards anyone. They told me when I was more with it, I wasn't getting enough oxygen as I wouldn't keep my mask and that made me very confused.

See, I knew they could sedate me if they really wanted to.

Besides the lack of oxygen... Sounds like when it comes to your fight/flight response, you fight.

Hi Danno,

How common is it? Depends entirely on the surgeon. Many use it, many don't. The use of the NG tube is one of those controversial topics in the surgical world. So the surgeon makes the call based on the condition of your bowels, the type of surgery, and why you're going under the knife. It's not used just in case your bowels don't "wake up", but also to give the freshly connected bowels time to heal. If the connection leaks, you're truly up shit's creek and the surgeon is going back in to do it all over again. So a couple of days of a tube up your nose is well worth not having to be cut open again, not to mention the chance of sepsis killing you before they figure out there's a leak. There's worse things they can do to you in the hospital.

;O)

Had the first one put in during an operation under sedation. Accidentally pulled it out, and the doctor thought it didn't need to be replaced. I wound up having the worst day of my hospital stay. Finally, they had to put it back in place. I wouldn't want to go through that again. Instant relief, I couldn't believe how much fluid was drained. I'll take one down the nose anytime to avoid the day that I had.

Yeah, that's exactly why they do it when you're sedated. Not a fun thing to do when awake. Not even fun to think about.

;O)

I have had multiple abdominal surgeries and ended up with ileus every time. I tried not to have one at reversal and I paid for my choice! For me, it beats the chance of me not surviving. I had one for 20 days once after reversal and I wish I would have asked them to do it while I was under. There are ways to protect from removal, there is a U-shaped piece, bridle NG tube, and even suturing in place, neither are 100% but helps with accidental removal. I choose to have it every time when I need abdominal surgery, but it is my choice. You can go without if the doctor allows, but you may pay for it. I know I did! Good luck

Clint

I'm really jealous you got to be sedated, not gonna lie. I begged to be sedated, and they just brought more people in to hold me. I don't even know how I had the strength to fight whoever was holding different parts of me after throwing up for days (adrenaline?!). But they were right; within an hour, I stabilized and started acting more human, not in distress. They did try to give me Ativan through IV to calm my body down, but I blew right through it.

They suture it to your nose??? Mine was just taped.

I can be a problem coming out of anesthesia... If I feel cold, pain, something that will trigger my PTSD so Cleveland Clinic will wrap me head to toe in blankets after. I did notice they keep my arms and legs strapped down for a bit longer now. I asked how I did the last time I was waking up and they said I just moved around a lot like a kid with ADHD (I do have ADHD). I wonder how much our brains go to those more primal places when we sense distress.

Hi there Baggers. I've always had an NG after belly surgery. The docs said it was necessary so I complied, no problem. I thought it was a small price to pay for not having to endure another surgery so I just accepted it, not only for the bile but for the gas buildup in my stomach.

In Ireland the NG is not placed as a standard part of abdominal surgery. I actually asked, begged them to put an NG tube in. My belly was swelling and the pain got steadily worse over two days so I had the surgeon come visit and eventually agreed. I guess it's just another procedure that can cause very real injury to the throat while going down. Things progressed rapidly after my surgeon left. It took hours for someone to get to me and install the NG. As the young doc came to my bed I was in huge panic. The trapped gas in my stomach had my abdomen tight as a drum....explosion felt imminent...literally felt like my stomach would explode any second! I was almost screaming at her to "get that thing into my stomach before it explodes....please...!!!" The doc was a bit flustered and dropped a couple of things in the face of my panic!! The young doc quickly hopped up on the bed and straddled my waist as a nurse kept my head steady. After a couple of wrong turns she got it in place. They had a quite big container for drainage attached to the tube. When the nurse opened the little valve and the green stuff flowed it was like full on (tiny) garden hose!!! The relief was instant as the gas propelled bile poured into the container. My belly deflated in 30 seconds. After that I always asked for an NG because every time, every surgery my gut took a while to wake up.

If your gut takes time to wake up you really should have an NG...IMHO. It can be done very quickly with an experienced person doing it.

Magoo

Just to point out a possible problem that can occur if the NG is left in too long.

In Ireland, my brother had a temporary ileostomy because of a colonoscopy gone wrong. His colon was punctured by the scope, he had diverticulitis, and really shouldn't have had the scope at that time.

Anyway... after surgery, an NG tube was placed. It took maybe two weeks for his colon to behave normally and the NG came out.

He began having light stuff, like soup, crackers, etc., and seemed okay. I was my brother's "wingman" because I know shit goes wrong and someone with a bit of medical info and knowledge has to be watching out for problems.

My brother was losing weight instead of gaining weight over the next week. The nurses said that he had regular meals (Irish Hospital food is quite good actually!!) but he didn't seem to be improving in his mobility and his weight, which was really worrying. At the best, he would weigh... 125 or 30 pounds, so when I could count his ribs, I knew something was wrong.

I started bringing him Burger King and McDonald's food and thick milkshakes... he likes it so I figured I would load him up with calories. All this time he had an IV for fluids. I brought him cases of "Ensure" in all flavors and left them within arm's reach.

I was going to see him every single day and nobody could figure it out, he seemed to be eating and drinking but was still losing weight and cancer was ruled out... we were all scratching our heads!!!

One day another brother joined me for my daily visit to the hospital. We brought Big Macs for the three of us with fries and milkshakes. I wanted to sit and watch him eating and sure enough... bites were taken and fries were eaten and we became even more worried and puzzled.

As we said our goodbyes... eat your food lecture... etc... and left. As we entered the hall where the patient couldn't see us, my brother peeked around the corner and had a big grin when he turned to me. "Take a look, he's spitting the food that he had in his mouth into a paper napkin and stuffing it into the pocket of his robe"!!! Now we were really puzzled.

We speculated for a few minutes and went back to his bedside. I asked if he liked the Ensure and he said he loved it and showed me that half of the twelve-pack I had brought was gone!! I had a bright idea and opened his locker to get new socks for him.

Mystery solved... part of the mystery. There must have been at least 12 bottles of Ensure hidden under his clothes... obviously hidden on purpose!!! Then I looked in the bin and there were several napkins containing chewed food!!! The mystery deepens!!!

We spent an hour talking and asking him why he was doing all this and pretending to eat but actually eating almost nothing. He could not explain it himself!! The nurses would often bring the food and leave it on his table. The kitchen staff would take the tray of uneaten food away and when the nurse looked in again she assumed he had eaten it and added the food intake to his chart!!

I asked several nurses if they had actually seen my brother eat any of the food that he was given. Their memory had convinced them that he had eaten, the food was there, the food was gone. After thinking for a minute, one nurse admitted that she hadn't actually seen him eat. I first asked my brother if anyone had looked down his throat to check for anything that would inhibit his ingestion of food. He said yes that someone had done an inspection of his mouth and throat and it was all good in there. I persevered and asked if they had used an instrument to look down there to get a look way in there. He said he just opened his mouth, they had a quick peek and said his throat was fine. I called his doc for a meeting and in the hallway. I told him the story (food-filled napkins, the hidden Ensure) and asked for an ENT to do a proper examination of his throat... right down to his vocal cords. No problem he said, we'll get our ENT in here to see your brother today.

The lady who came to see him was actually a speech therapist. I was a bit puzzled but I waited and observed what was going on.

In about 5 minutes, that speech therapist had the mystery solved!! The NG tube had been left in his throat for longer than usual, his belly just would not wake up!! When it's in for a long time it can paralyze a part of the throat called the pharynx. There is a little flap of muscle that closes off the path to your lungs when you swallow food to prevent aspiration and that was the problem.

My brother's body kicked the food back when he tried to swallow. I guess he was being the good patient and do what he had to do... eat food!! He didn't know why exactly he wasn't swallowing the food and in his severely weakened condition he could make no sense of it all.

I forget how they resolved the flap problem. I believe they gave him IV nutrition and fluids until the "flap" began operating again by itself. When it got back to normal he was eating like a horse!!!

This is a quite rare condition and only occurs after weeks of having an NG tube so don't let it color your opinion of NGs too much. It is a pain swallowing that thing while gulping water but sometimes it's just gotta be done!!

Magoo

I've had 7 surgeries involving the GI tract plus a few extra obstructions just for fun. Have had the NG tube 5 or 6 times, so it's not every time. After the last one I decided I would rather risk death from my intestines rupturing than have another one. I also think doctors/nurses shouldn't be allowed to put one in unless they've had one inserted while they were fully awake and not medicated.

I also heard that the pain medication in the hospital causes them to sleep and slows down the process of "waking up."

For this reason, I will never take pain medication after surgery again. I will tough it out to lower the chance.

They tried to get me twice while I was awake and for some reason without water. I'm only learning about the ice water now. They just used lube.

A dear friend of mine is a hospitalist at Cleveland Clinic!

Those warm blankets fresh out of the blanket warmer! I love those!

So true! The hospital tried talking me into a new way of not using the pain medication to avoid all that stuff but I wouldn't do it. I paid dearly by using it but damn I was in so much pain. After the lieus started they cut me back though.

So what's worse... an ex-wife or NG tube?

They're the best. I always ask for like 5 more and then when I need to get up it's like good luck finding my way out of the blankets.