What symptoms are caused by problems with diet and digestion?

It is common for people with pancreatic cancer to get symptoms caused by problems digesting food.

Symptoms include:

• losing your appetite
• losing weight, or struggling to put weight back on
• indigestion or heartburn
• runny poo (diarrhoea)
• finding it harder to poo (constipation)
• pale, oily, floating poo (steatorrhoea)
• tummy pain or discomfort
• bloating or wind
• feeling full up quickly
• feeling sick
• needing to poo quickly, especially after eating.

Some of these symptoms can be caused by other things. For example, chemotherapy can cause side effects including sickness, diarrhoea and appetite loss.

Some treatments or medicines can hide symptoms. Your medical team will help you manage any symptoms you have alongside the medicines. Do not stop taking any medicines without speaking to your doctor, nurse or dietitian first.

Talk to your doctor, nurse or dietitian about any symptoms you have. There are ways to manage your symptoms. This includes taking pancreatic enzymes.

Jaundice

Jaundice makes your eyes and skin turn yellow, and you may feel itchy. It can also cause loss of appetite, taste changes, feeling and being sick, dark urine and pale poo.

Jaundice is caused by the cancer blocking the bile duct. The bile duct carries bile from the liver to the small intestine. Jaundice can be treated by putting a tube called a stent into the bile duct to open it up.

What is steatorrhoea?

Steatorrhoea is caused by fat in the poo. Your poo may be pale, oily, smell worse than normal, and difficult to flush down the toilet. It happens if your body isn’t making enough enzymes to digest the fat in your food properly. It also happens if the enzymes are blocked from getting to the bowel, where they are needed for digestion. It is not caused by eating too much fat. You should not reduce fat in your food. Talk to your doctor or dietitian if you have signs of steatorrhoea.

Diarrhoea (runny poo)

Pancreatic cancer can cause diarrhoea. Pancreatic enzymes can help manage this if it is caused by problems with your digestion. Treatments such as chemotherapy can also cause diarrhoea, and your medical team can give you medicines for this.

Diarrhoea can be a sign of an infection. If you are having chemotherapy and have diarrhoea more than four times a day, phone the 24 hour emergency number that your chemotherapy team should have given you.

If your diarrhoea doesn’t get better if you are taking enzymes, there could be another cause. Bile acid diarrhoea can happen if there is too much bile in the intestine. Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) can also cause diarrhoea. This is caused by too many bacteria in the intestine. Speak to your doctor, nurse or GP. You may need to see a gastroenterology team, who are experts in problems with the stomach and intestines. There are tests and medicines for bile acid diarrhoea and SIBO.

If the cancer blocks the duodenum

Pancreatic cancer can block the duodenum, which is the first part of the small intestine. This can cause symptoms such as feeling full quickly, feeling and being sick, and losing weight.

A tube called a stent can be put into the duodenum to hold it open so food can pass through. This should stop you being sick and you should start to feel like eating again. You may need to change your diet to make sure the stent doesn’t get blocked.

Updated March 2023

Review date March 2025