What is the standard protocol for a colonoscopy?

I was told to take the over the counter, Bisacodyl 5 mg. and drink the Gatorade with dissolved powder. It works amazingly well. Amazingly. Don’t stray too far from a toilet.

Sorry, I don’t know the name of the pills. However, I can tell you that you will definitely want to stay home from work that day!

I’ll second what @worriedguy had to say. They work amazingly well!

Shouldn’t you ask your doctor?

Well, I just had my third one two weeks ago. This time I was supposed to take 4 Ducolox and then later drink half a gallon of this horrible liquid, and then the other half the next morning. My colonscopy was in the afternoon. I have never taken the whole dose of what is prescribed. I took 3 Ducolox, and wound up drinking ⅔ of that horrible drink in total. I think they gave that same prescription to 200 pound men, and I am a 140 pound woman. I should say I am not a doctor, and doctors don’t like when I say this, they usually reply with some 110 people don’t clear out even when they follow the regimen. I don’t believe it. A relative of mine last year did only ducolax pills, because she has a blood pressure problems, and I told her to only take ¾ of the dose, and she did not listen to me, and she almost went to the ER, her husband was completely freaked about it.

Afternoon colonoscopies are best, because your last meal is breakfast, a lighter meal typically. Diprovin is my preferred anesthetic, I request it now.

Also, I wanted to say that everyone complains about the prep, and the worst part for me is drinking the stuff, I have a really hard time drinking or eating something I don’t like, much like a kid complains when they have to do it. But, the going to the bathroom is not that bad in my opinion. It’s annoying, but not that bad.

Is Miralax, the big gallon jug? If so, you can kind of gauge how you are doing. When you are cleaned out everything is tranparent, it will look like you are peeing in the toilette. Although, you can go clear and then several hours later when you start a second or thrid dose, however your is prescribed not be. You still need to take some of that second dose and see how you are doing.

Sorry to be so graphic.

Might it be 2 bisacodyl (Dulcolax) tablets? Source

One gallon of liquid chalk. How sadistic.

I was given 1 gallon of a product ironically named Golytely, which is polyethylene glycol—to induce a watery diarrhea. I only got about 3 quarts down but apparently it was sufficient.

^^^^^^ I definitely would have cheated and not finished it. A poster was right: they do a “one size fits all” prep where they use the same amount of ICK for a 100lb woman as they do for a 350 lb man. or woman.

I didn’t finish my gallon, either. That experience was horrible enough to make me reconsider ever doing it again. My doctor made noises about there being something that vaguely looked questionable, so I should get checked in 5 years instead of 10, but I said he had to give me a decade.

I’ve since heard there is a low volume liquid method, too. I guess it has a higher incidence of not clearing you out enough, so many not all doctors are fond of it.

There was, however, a really nice thing about my colonoscopy—my surgeon was really, really hot! or was that the drugs? “Hey dear, now you’ve seen me at my worst, want to get to know the better part of me?” “You’ve already seen what an ass I am, it can’t go anywhere but up!”

^^^^^^^^^^ GA. Very clever. I can relate: my GP is so handsome and everything else that I’m considering switching doctors. LOL!!
I can’t take the torture; I know it’s nuts.

As someone who has actually performed over a thousand colonoscopies I can say that there is nothing worse than a poorly prepped bowel. The intestine is more or less the same length whether you’re 300 pounds or 100 pounds, so the prep is the same. It’s just a tube.

A poorly prepped bowel increases the procedure time, markedly decreases the sensitivity of the test, and increases the discomfort of the test because more time is spent washing and suctioning than actually looking. It can triple the procedure time, and I can’t tell you how many times I have found dangerous polyps hidden under puddles of liquid poop, and who knows how many I missed because of poor preps. So do your prep properly, even if you have to hold your nose.

And the answer to the original poster is bisocodyl or Ducolax. The other people had that answer correct.

@Rarebear What kind of clean out would you recommend as the most effective/least distasteful?

@janbb They’re all bad. We use a Miralax prep. This isn’t ours—I found this using Google, but it’s more or less the same.
http://www.healthinfotranslations.com/pdfDocs/Miralax_Ducolax_Bowel_Prep_Som_FINAL.pdf

How about an Exlax overdose followed by an irrigation the size of the Pacific?

Where I work we use polyethylene glycol. It’s pretty foul but if you can tolerate taking it, it’s incredibly effective.

I’d also like to reiterate what rarebear said about the imporatance of good bowel prep. It doesn’t take much stool in the bowel to start making things hard to see especially small polyps. I’ve found a cancer in a 2mm polyp so it is incredibly important to have a good prep.

On the plus side the prep is usually worse than the procedure.

If you want to see what a poorly prepped colon looks like, click here. WARNING, it’s not for the faint of heart. You can see how ANYTHING can be hidden underneath there.

The cause of most colon polyps is not known, but they are common in adults.
Most colon polyps are not cancer. But some growths can turn into colon cancer. If a colon polyp is the kind that can turn into cancer, it usually takes many years for that to happen.
Source: webmd.com
I wonder how they can verify that a polyp is a so-called pre-cancerous one such as Dr Oz ,the vegetarian had?

@Aster Becasue we cut them out and send them to the lab to look at them under the microscope. Also during colonoscopy a well trained colonoscopist can make an educated guess as to what a polyp may be, particulaly with the use of in vivo stains, zoom colonscopes, a colonoscope with confocal microscopes and an ultrasound probe.

Told you the doctors hate when I say that I think it is an overdose for people who weigh less. I think it is not about the legnth of the colon, but the amount of food. Lower weight people generally eat less, so I think there is less to clear out. I also think people lie, to the doctors about taking all of the medicine. The nurse who checked me in asked me before the test if I had takn it all, and I replied to her, “no,” with a tone of, of course not, in my voice.

But, again, I am not a doctor. Certainly you want to be clear so the doctor can see everything (by the way my doctor said I was very cleared out, he made a point to reassure me who could see very well, he found a very small polyp that he said could have been easily missed, and another little something to biopsy).

My first polyp was found at he age of 31, maybe I was 32? And, now again I have a small one at 42. I recommend doing the test, especially if you have colon cancer in your family.

@Lightlyseared thank you. So are you looking for atypical cells?—And/or malignant cells? And if you find malignant cells, do you look for metastases with CT and blood testing?

@JLeslie Don’t get me wrong—I don’t hate what you said. If that prep works for you, great! You certainly know, having been through several colonoscopies. My point is that it’s not weight based. I’ve scoped little 90 pound women who take chronic narcotics and they’re not clean despite two preps, and bit 300 pound men who are as clean as a whistle with one.

@Aster You can often tell what kind of polyp it is just by looking, but definitive diagnosis is made with the pathologist under the microscope. The workup for cancer includes a CT scan, yes.

@Rarebear It makes sense that diet and medications would affect how well it works. Narcotics are constipating, meat diet vs. a veg diet. But, you can’t argue that everything being equal a person who eats larger meals has more in their colon. My sister was a nurse in a hospital for a while and she had to clean bedpans sometimes, and all the nurses hated the fat people for that very reason. Not to mention I have an overweight relative that clogs my toilettes almost every time he visits. Gross. No one else ever has.

That is gross. In any case, I’m glad you’re getting regular survaillance.

I probably offended some overweight people.