Acid Reflux Disease symptoms: knowing your body

Acid Reflux Disease is a condition in which abnormal reflux of stomach acid into the esophagus. This phenomenon is irregular experienced by most people, especially after eating.

Our body uses gastric and stomach acids to break the food we eat. Normally, after digestion in the stomach, the food is delivered by the digestive system to the muscles of the intestines extra for digestion. However, in patients with acid reflux disease, the contents of the stomach acid moving to the esophagus, causing inflammation. Cigarettes, alcohol, caffeine, pregnancy, and fatty foods are some of the factors that worsened the conditions of acid reflux.

Our current knowledge about acid reflux based on medical research tells us that this disease is common in men as in women. There is no sexual preference. In addition, the prevalence of acid reflux is most common in people aged 40 or over.

The symptoms of acid reflux may be typical or atypical. However, based on the diagnosis of acid reflux patients, only 70% of people who have this disease manifest symptoms typical.

Typical symptoms concern oesophageal or indicators that are related to the esophagus. These symptoms are:

Acidity. This is a condition in which the patient feels a painful burning sensation in the esophagus. The pain often develops in the chest and may swell to the throat or neck. This is most likely to occur in connection with these activities: after a heavy meal, lifting, bending over and lying down. Based on a survey, about 75% of acid reflux patients experience this symptom at night. These nearly-time patients also tend to experience more severe pain than those whose symptoms occur at other times.

Dyspepsia. Research shows that about half of acid reflux patients have dyspepsia. This is a syndrome consisting of pain and discomfort in the upper abdomen, nausea after a meal, the stomach and fullness. It is not a rule, however, that those with dyspepsia had acid reflux.

Regurgitation. This is when stomach contents back up into the pharynx and sometimes as far as the mouth. In cases where acid has been spilled in the airway, respiratory complications can be stimulated.

There are many cases, however, that acid reflux patients do not manifest symptoms such as heartburn and regurgitation. Instead, the experience extraesophageal or atypical symptoms that include:

Symptoms of throat. Although it does not happen commonly, acid reflux patients suffer from symptoms that occur in the throat. Hoarseness, the feeling of having a lump in the throat, dry cough are submitted by those who have acid laryngitis, a throat symptoms. Patients may also have difficulty swallowing, a condition known as dysphagia. In critical cases, the food can get trapped in the throat or choke, which can lead to severe chest pain. Other symptoms include chronic throat sore throat and persistent hiccups.

Nausea and vomiting. When a patient suffers from nausea which persists for weeks, may have acid reflux. There are few cases where vomiting may occur as often as once a day.

Respiratory symptoms. Coughing and wheezing are counted as respiratory symptoms. These result from the invasion of stomach acid into the airway creating bronchoconstriction.

Acid reflux disease can last for several months if they do not receive adequate medical care. Drug treatment may be required only for a short period of time. But when the symptoms tend to occur repeatedly, drug treatment may have to be again.