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5:10pm February 8, 2014

demolitionmortician:

i’m getting an NJ tube in a few weeks due to my inability to eat. any insight into living with one of these things? if all goes well, and tube feeds work for me, i’ll look into getting a more permanent tube.

I’ve never had a long-term NG or NJ tube, but for permanent tubes generally for gastroparesis you’ll get either a J tube, or a GJ tube, or a G tube and a J tube.

I’d strongly recommend looking into either a GJ tube, or a G tube and a J tube.  (A GJ tube is a couple of tubes combined going into one hole into your abdomen.  A G tube and a J tube would be a G tube in one hole into your abdomen and a J tube into a separate hole.  Each has different strengths and weaknesses.)

The reason for this is that a J tube alone will feed you okay, but a GJ tube or a G tube in addition to a J tube, gives you a means to drain fluid and air out of your stomach through “venting” or “burping” the G tube.  (Which there is a lot more to it than what the nurses will generally show you.  At least in my experience it takes a lot of experimentation to successfully burp a G tube.)  That can be just as crucial for gastroparesis treatment as feeding into the J tube is, because the air and bile can build up and back up into your lungs or cause pain and discomfort.  You can also attach a drainage bag (I use a suction drainage bag, gravity drainage doesn’t work for me) to the G tube so that you aren’t constantly having to drain it manually, especially when you’re sleeping.

I have a GJ tube and am possibly switching this year to a G tube plus an additional J tube in a different hole.  I’ve never had an NJ tube, and I’ve only had an NG tube for extremely short periods of time.  So that’s why I’m only discussing the kind of tubes I know.