Chronic Pancreatitis

Pancreatitis is inflammation of your pancreas. Your pancreas is an organ in your upper belly that makes juices that help you digest food. Your pancreas also makes insulin, which helps control your blood sugar.

The Pancreas

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Chronic pancreatitis is a long-term condition. Scar tissue forms in your pancreas and keeps causing problems. Pancreatitis that starts suddenly is called acute pancreatitis. Getting acute pancreatitis over and over again can cause chronic pancreatitis.

• Chronic pancreatitis causes belly pain

• The pain may be constant or may come and go

• The pancreas stops making juices that help you digest your food

• Sometimes chronic pancreatitis damages cells that make insulin and you get diabetes

• Treatment includes changing your diet, taking special medicines to help digest food, avoiding alcohol, and taking medicines to relieve the pain

The Pancreas

Causes of chronic pancreatitis include:

• Heavy, long term alcohol abuse

• Having a gene (physical trait you inherit from a parent) for certain disorders, such as cystic fibrosis, hereditary pancreatitis, or autoimmune pancreatitis

Sometimes there's no clear cause.

The main symptom is:

• Pain in your upper belly (the area below your breastbone)

The pain may follow one of several patterns:

• Pain that goes away or gets better but keeps coming back

• Severe pain that lasts for several hours or up to several days

You may also have other symptoms such as:

• Bulky, unusually stinky, light-colored stool

• Weight loss and malnutrition

• High blood sugar caused by diabetes

Chronic pancreatitis can raise the risk of cancer of the pancreas.

Doctors do certain tests, such as:

• Blood tests

• Stool tests to see if you're absorbing your food

• X-rays of your belly

• CT (computed tomography) scans

• MRCP (a special kind of MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) that lets your doctor see your liver, gallbladder, bile ducts, pancreas, or pancreatic duct)

• Endoscopic ultrasound (a special kind of ultrasound using a long tube that's passed through your mouth and down into your intestine)

Doctors treat pain caused by chronic pancreatitis by:

• Giving you pain medicine

People with severe pancreatitis may have to stay in the hospital.

Doctors treat digestive problems caused by pancreatitis by having you:

• Eat 4 to 5 low-fat meals a day

• Take pancreatic enzyme extracts to help you digest food better

• Sometimes, take certain vitamins (A, D, E, and K)

Doctors will have you avoid alcohol and stop smoking.

Doctors may do surgery to treat your chronic pancreatitis if you have severe pain and other treatments don’t help you. They may remove some of the diseased pancreas, open up the pancreatic duct, or cut nerves near the pancreas to relieve the pain.