Hi all
As we all know the liver shrinking diet from hell is intended to drain the glycogen (glucose) from the liver, the liver shrinks down to half its normal size and therefore the surgeon can use a lever to lever it out of the way whilst he perfoms the op ! The diet isn't intended to help or make the paitent lose weight pre the operation.
It takes 5-7 days on a low fat, low cal liquid diet to drain the liver to its optimal size. The 1 week liquid diet i was given was 800 cals a day, to be honest i was so keyed up for the op i found it pretty easy to maintain, and the week flew by.
Different surgeons use different pre op diets, some use a low cal diet thats not as servere or hard on the paitent to slowly reduce the glycogen in the belief its easier to follow, others use the milk diet etc etc, its just hit and miss, though knowing now what i know if i were going through this again i'd ask my surgeon what pre op i could do and if i didn't like the option he gave discuss a different sort, they are experts at what they do, but you know and understand how your likely to react to a set pre op diet, you may be like me and find a week of liquid low cal easier to handle than 4 weeks on a fat reduced low cal diet, or even the dreaded milk diet, if you suggested a liguid replacement for a week they might agree to it, end of the day he needs your liver shrunk to do the op, how you do that could be be open for discussion !
