Hi all,

I have a question about band blockage, (when food gets stuck)

What happens when the food get stuck, I mean does it go down after a while? does it hurt? does it come out in a form of vomit? Would it ever stick there for few days/weeks??

Thanks,

It will move either up or down within, I'd say, an hour or two at the most. The body is NOT happy with something actually stuck in the stoma, and that's part of what causes PBing (when food comes back up). It's not exactly "vomit" because there is no stomach acid involved, but it is regurgitation.

Sometimes the stuck thing can go down, too. When that happens, you feel instant relief. There's all sorts of different ways it can resolve, but resolve it does sooner or later.

This past summer I got stuck on a tiny piece of leftover steak that I had for lunch. It would not go up no matter how hard I tried, nor down and drinking fluids was practically impossible. At about 8PM that evening I knew I had to call the doctor (it was a Saturday). Well, he was at a bariatrics seminar in Florida and I live in California. He recommended that I first call my primary MD to see if someone at Stanford could do it, and if needed call the bariatric surgeon on call at UC San Francisco.

Well, I ended up going to San Francisco after umpteen phone calls and not knowing where I was (thank God hubby drove). Got a full unfill and felt instant relief.

Like Alexandra said most things will go up or down eventually and I usually don't have any problems. But that day my body just did not want to cooperate with me. Needless to say, I eat very little steak nowadays and chew it to absolute mush.

There is definitely discomfort when an item is stuck and you won't even want to try to drink Water after the meal. Your band definitely is in control and you just have to listen to it (sometimes it whispers too). But 99.9% of the time you can feel the stuck item move downward and definitely feel it if it comes up.

Hope that helps.

yeah itll go one way or the other-for me if it holds its ground for too long i force myself to cough it up-im not about to be miserable for too long when i can fix it myself.

Yea, Atalina, what is up with that cough reflex. I by accident got the juicy mouth and thought well if i just go to the bathroom and spit I'll be ok but I coughed also (not intentionally) and poof it (slime) came up and I was relieved. I found out last nite that pork chops do not work for me. I thought I would try a piece since I have not had one since surgery. Back to the drawing board.