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Millions of people suffer from Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD),
which is sometimes referred to as reflux or reflux esophagitis. Although
almost everyone experiences reflux at some time--it occurs when acid
from the stomach backs up into the esophagus--some people experience it
frequently and severely.
About 40 million Americans suffer from frequent heartburn, the
most common symptom of GERD, which usually occurs after a meal.
Regurgitation of gastric acid or sour contents into the mouth, difficult
or painful swallowing and chest pain can also occur. Acid may also be
regurgitated into the lungs, which can result in asthma, coughing,
wheezing and hoarseness, and if acid reaches the mouth it can dissolve
teeth enamel.
Fortunately, the
Treatment of GERD is one of the easiest issues I resolve
in my clinical practice. Routinely maintaining the healthy eating
program in my book, The
No-Grain Diet, and drinking up to one gallon of pure water per day
combined with high doses of a good quality probiotic (beneficial
bacteria), is enough to restore normal stomach function in the vast
majority of patients. Normally you will want to drink enough water to
keep your urine a light yellow color. However, when you have acid reflux
or ulcer disease, larger amounts of water may be necessary to dilute the
acid and normalize the pH in your stomach.
Elimination of sugar is also a major effective strategy that aids
healing. If you are overweight the elimination of most grains will also
be helpful by lowering insulin levels.
People with GERD are often warned against eating fatty foods, but
studies have shown that it is actually too many calories--not too much
fat--that results in stomach upset, so I don’t typically recommend that
patients with GERD follow a strictly low-fat diet. Part of the reason
why a low-fat diet is destined to be a disaster is that it tends to be
high in grains. High-grain diets will cause your insulin levels to
elevate, which in turn will cause a whole domino series of biochemical
interactions that will push a person away from health.
High insulin levels are associated with a wide variety of health
problems such as:
- obesity
- high blood pressure
- high cholesterol
- diabetes
Even if these conditions are not expressed clinically they may
have sub-threshold effects, which worsen the GERD and ulcer conditions.
It is also believed that an infection called H. pylori may cause ulcers.
High insulin levels will cause disruption of the immune system and
decrease your ability to fight this infection.
Adequate
vitamin D
intake
is
also an important variable for stomach health. Normally, sunshine is the
ideal source for vitamin D, but over half the United States does not
have adequate sources of sunshine for a large percentage of the year, so
you may need to supplement your diet. Vitamin D3 (not vitamin D2, which
is synthetic) is the preferred form.
An excellent source of vitamin D is cod liver oil, which will also
provide you with beneficial
omega-3s. I
recommend Carlson’s brand because I’ve found its quality, in terms of
purity, freshness and potency, to be superior to all the other brands
I’ve tried. I now carry
Carlson’s cod liver
oil in the "Recommended
Products" section, or you can look for it in your local health food
store. You should also monitor your blood levels to make certain that
adequate doses are taken, as it is possible to overdose on vitamin
D.
Garlic
is also important for stomach health, and you should be eating it every
day. It is important to note that the garlic MUST be fresh. The active
ingredient is destroyed within several hours of smashing the garlic.
Garlic pills are virtually worthless and should not be used. When you
use the garlic, it is important to compress the garlic with a spoon
prior to swallowing it if you are not going to juice it. If you swallow
the clove intact you will not convert the allicin to its active
ingredient. One problem, of course, is the smell, but most people can
tolerate a few cloves a day. If you develop a "socially offensive" odor,
then decrease the volume of garlic slightly until there is no odor
present.
With these inexpensive, safe and extremely effective natural
solutions out there, it’s unfortunate that so many people are being
prescribed drugs for heartburn. Drugs for stomach and upper digestive
system problems are among the largest selling medicines in the country,
and sales amount to billions of dollars per year. Although the
drugs--proton pump inhibitors like Prevacid, Prilosec and Nexium and the
H2 blocker agents like Tagament, Pepcid and Zantac--do provide relief
for this problem, they are true prescriptions for disaster, and
they
seriously impair your digestion.
One of the problems with these drugs is that they significantly
reduce the amount of acid in your stomach, thus affecting your ability
to properly digest food. Reduction of acid in the stomach also
diminishes your primary defense mechanism for food-borne infections,
thereby increasing your risk of food poisoning.
Additionally, if you don't digest and absorb your food properly
you will not only increase your risk of stomach atrophy but also nearly
every other chronic degenerative disease.
These drugs are touted as a miracle cure for heartburn for
millions of people and are major moneymakers for the drug companies.
Consider the mass marketing tactics of Prilosec, the original "Purple
Pill" for heartburn that became the world’s best-selling prescription
drug, the number one medication prescribed for seniors, and made profits
of $6 billion a year.
When the patent on
Prilosec expired, the drug’s manufacturer,
AstraZeneca, started a half-a-billion-dollar marketing campaign to move
consumers onto their next costly "Purple Pill,"
Nexium. They
even hired 1,300 sales reps just to promote the new drug.
Although studies showed, and many experts agreed, that Nexium was
hardly more effective than the original pill, AstraZeneca was able to
successfully transfer 42 percent of patients on Prilosec to Nexium. As a
consumer it’s important that you are aware of when a drug is truly a
necessity, and when it is simply a tool to increase drug companies’
profits.
Most people ignore that heartburn is an important clue from their
body that something is off kilter and rely on these drugs to suppress
the symptoms. But covering up the symptoms will not solve the underlying
problem, and if you don’t address the cause you will likely end up with
more serious problems down the road. |
