Expert: John Quackenbush DC - 11/7/2010

Question
Dear Doctor,

My name is Chancy, I'm male, 29 years old.

About 10 days ago, I had a pain in the right flank area
right below the rib cage (the right side, not front or
back). I start to feel the pain about 20m
after eating fries and hamburg. The pain became worse in
about 3 hours so I went to Hospital Emergency.

The doctor tested my blood and urine, and told me there's
blood in the urine so it is kidney stone and sent me home.

In the next day the pain is greatly relieved (from 7/10 to
4/10). The pain location moved a little bit to the front.
This is really different from kidney stone pain I suffered 3
years ago. I started to worry and went to emergency again.

I did a CT, and the doctor told me the 'kidney stone' had
passed out so I'd be fine and sent me home. The pain almost
disappeared after 4 days. Now I don't have the pain.

But my primary doctor called me 3 days ago and said she
thought I was having a gallstone but not kidney stone, and
asked me to schedule an ultrasound test in the next week.

Before the  ultrasound, I really want to know, whether my
case is more like a gallstone or not, and did I have a acute
cholecystitis or chronic cholecystitis? Do I need to remove
the gallbladder? I really don't want to remove it from my
body cause I'm really young for that.

Thanks a lot

Answer
Chancy,

One way to rule out the gall stone is to have the ultrasound done! It's not that invasive and it will be a good start to rule in or rule out gall stones!

I am not qualified to answer your question about surgery. But if you were a relative of mine I would say get the ultrasound done asap and this will help you to find out if you even have a gallstone.

Hope this information helps.

John Q Quackenbush DC