Differential Diagnosis
- Single most likely diagnosis
- Dumping syndrome: This condition occurs when food, especially sugar, moves from the stomach to the small bowel too quickly. Symptoms include cramping, diarrhea, and rapid heart rate after eating, which align with the patient's symptoms. The recent distal pancreatectomy and stent placement may have altered the stomach's ability to regulate food passage.
- Other Likely diagnoses
- Gastroparesis: Delayed stomach emptying can cause cramping, nausea, and vomiting after eating. The patient's recent surgery and stent placement may have affected stomach motility.
- Pancreatic insufficiency: The patient's pancreatectomy may have resulted in inadequate pancreatic enzyme production, leading to malabsorption and symptoms like cramping and diarrhea after eating.
- Stent occlusion or malfunction: The stent placed to drain the pancreatic pseudocyst may be occluded or malfunctioning, causing symptoms like cramping and rapid heart rate after eating due to increased pressure or infection.
- Do Not Miss (ddxs that may not be likely, but would be deadly if missed.)
- Internal hernia: Although rare, an internal hernia can occur after abdominal surgery and cause bowel obstruction, which may present with cramping and rapid heart rate after eating.
- Hemorrhage or bleeding: Post-surgical bleeding can be life-threatening and may cause symptoms like rapid heart rate, cramping, and abdominal pain.
- Infection or abscess: Infection or abscess formation at the surgical site or stent placement area can cause severe symptoms, including sepsis, and must be ruled out.
- Rare diagnoses
- Superior mesenteric artery syndrome: This rare condition involves compression of the duodenum between the abdominal aorta and superior mesenteric artery, causing symptoms like cramping and rapid heart rate after eating.
- Intestinal ischemia: Reduced blood flow to the intestines can cause cramping, rapid heart rate, and other symptoms after eating, although this is a rare complication after pancreatectomy and stent placement.