Welcome to Cancer Chat, Sharonna.

I'm sorry to hear that you were diagnosed with bladder cancer last October and that now you are dealing with a lot of pain. 

I hope that some of our members who can relate to your experience will come along shortly to offer advice but until then I thought I'd send you this page from our website with information on cancer pain and maybe that can help you a little.

Also, feel free to give our cancer nurses a call if you feel like talking to someone medically trained might help, they're available on this phone number 0808 800 4040, Monday - Friday between 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.

Wishing you all the best,

Renata, Cancer Chat Moderator

Hi Sharonna. 

This might be a silly question, but have you actually asked for pain relief with each treatment?  On the MacMillan page for BCG it does list pain as a side effect, but also says that you can take painkillers.

Perhaps your GP or the hospital can give you a strong painkiller, such as a strong co-codamol, that you can take either before or soon after the treatment. I wouldn't take anything without discussing it with your GP and your treatment team. 

Hi, i was just told to take paracetamol by my nurse administering the bcg . I have terrible pain afterwards but he just said every patient says the same thing . 

Hmm. What a plonker! If every patient says the same thing then clearly they ALL need better pain relief. Where do they get these idiots from?  Seriously?? What a ******! :|

Well, that's my rant over. Paracetamol is ok, but it's clearly not adequate. Discuss with your GP whether or not you can add 400 mg Ibuprofen to the mix.  Or possibly the GP can prescribe something stronger. I had a panendoscopy on my throat last week, which left me in a lot of pain for a few days afterwards. My doctor prescribed Zapain, which is a mixture of paracetamol wiith 50 mg codeine. It's only available on prescription.  I could have taken up to 8 per day, but only needed 3 a day to make the pain go away completely for a whole 24 hours.  I only needed them for a couple of days and I've now come off them. 

Thank you , i will make an appointment to see my gp hopefully before  my next treatment. I will take anything to ease the pain right now.  

Are you in pain right NOW? 

I have a burning pain in my bladder all the time. Its worse going to the toilet. I get very sore after a day at work on my feet walking around . Cant wait to get the next 3 weeks of treatment over with. So i can start to recover.

I'm not a doctor, but I have had to deal with chronic pain from time to time.

Unless you've been told you can't use Ibuprofen, it's worth knowing that for an adult it is safe to take Ibuprofen and Paracetamol at the same time. This gives you a double hit of painkiller.  You can take the full dose of both, and then repeat the paracetamol every 4 hours and the ibuprofen every 6 hours. Just be sure not to exceed the doses and daily limits on the packets.  

There's more about taking them together on this page from the NHS website.

Note that this information applies to adults only. The situation for children is different.

Thank you for posting this . I will definitely give it a go. 

Hi Sharonna

Try to see your own GP as soon as you can. Maybe you can get some stronger painkillers. You really shouldn't be suffering like this. I think it's appalling.