Liquid Treatment Options?

[AndrewEsq]

Hi everyone,

I am new to the forum! My name is Andrew and on October 22nd, 2012 I was diagnosed with Crohn's Disease. My symptoms started on January 2011 while I was in law school (I was 23, turning 24 at the time), but the doctors did not detect it until I started to become anemic and recently began to lose weight. My dad has Crohn's, so it was obviously inherited genetically.

My symptoms are 'mild' to 'moderate', in my opinion. I have abdominal pain regularly after I eat (on a pain scale of 1 being little to 10 being agonizing, pain is usually a 4.) I do not have vomiting or rectal bleeding. I am glad I caught this early.

Here's my question, which will be a HUGE help to me. The gastro prescribed me medication, BUT they are in pill form and I have a really difficult time swallowing pills. Unfortunately, I just did not think to ask him of alternative meds and he did not know I had trouble swallowing them. I actually thought I could grind them down but the info out there says that chewing or grinding them would render the medicine ineffective. Are there ANY liquid or other forms of medication I can take without having to swallow it whole?

I will be following up with my gastro, but ideas and even lists of medicines that offer liquid or alternative treatments would be really, really helpful. I may also schedule an appointment with a holistic doctor.

Thank you so much for your time.

Andrew

 

[Jennifer]

Hi and welcome to the forum!

Ones I can think of off the top of my head are Enteral nutrition, Humira (injection) and Remicade (infusion). May I ask what you were prescribed? Do you have difficulty swallowing solid foods in general? This is the second time I've heard someone on here mention that they have a hard time swallowing pills (besides children) and I just want to understand why (is it just the idea of a pill, a flavor issue etc?). First person I asked didn't answer.

Some pills can come in a smaller dose (I know Prednisone comes in 5mg and I've heard mention of a 1mg pill). Talk to your GI about your swallowing issue to see if you can get a smaller pill if possible.

 

[AndrewEsq]

Thanks for the reply!

For me, this was a personal thing. When I was little, I've had several instances where I've almost choked, pretty bad, on food, especially things like a hard candy that sometimes did go down whole and got stuck in my throat. Again, I cannot speak for the other poster or why some people in general have issues with this.

I may end up trying different things, like taking it with pudding or putting the medicine inside of a marshmallow lol.

 

[AndrewEsq]

I was prescribed Pentasa (lucky me) and Budesonide.

 

[Jennifer]

Hmmm, I don't think either of those can be made into a smaller dose unfortunately. If it helps, my method for pill taking is to have about half to a quarter mouth full of liquid and tilt my head back then drop the pill into the pool of liquid and swallow. This has allowed me to be able to take multiple pills at one time. I imagine it would be difficult to get past the fear of possibly choking so it would still be a good idea to give your GI a call and ask about other treatment options for you. The sooner you speak to them the sooner you can start treatment.