Alex, a 30-year-old attorney and self-described fitness nut, was deeply frustrated. He had come to me for an evaluation after his third episode of acute pancreatitis. Each of the episodes had been intensely painful and landed him in the hospital for several days, where he hadn’t been allowed to eat anything and had received copious painkillers. Internists hadn’t found anything so far, so I had been asked by his referring doctors to look deeper to find a cause.
While most people think their stomach digests their food, in reality, the pancreas does most of this work. This organ sits behind the stomach and just in front of the spine, and is connected to the small intestine via several fine ducts. In addition to sodium bicarbonate (which the body uses to neutralize stomach acid), the pancreas makes digestive enzymes that break down carbohydrates, fats and proteins into small components that can ...
