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GERD issues
I am 22 years old. I don't smoke or drink. Growing up I can remember having a slight hoarse voice in the morning if I ate to late at nights. But never anything too miserable. It would go away within a hour after drinking water.
March 2011 on a Wednesday. I woke up with a hoarse voice that never went away. After a few weeks I started to get slightly worried so I went to my family doctor. I went 3 times over a course of 5-6 weeks and they had no idea after giving me multiple steroids and antibiotics that did nothing. I also had no pain in the beginning my throat didn't hurt at all. My only symptom was the voice. So they sent me to a throat specialist. (Audiologist) He did a throat endoscopy and told me I have GERD. He prescribed me omeprazole 20mg once a day. I changed my diet. I stopped eating hours before I went to sleep. I have never been a soda drinker, I am not a fan of fatty foods. The fattiest thing I like to eat sometimes is chocolate.. So I gave that up. I don't eat big meals. I have always been a snacker. But I didn't seem to get that much better so back as planned in 6weeks. He told me to start taking it twice a day. my throat started to hurt and become really sore around this point. I would wake up in severe pain, and it would hurt through out the day. I would take 2- 20mg omeprazole and I would also drink baking soda mixed with water whenever I couldn't handle the constant burn anymore.. I wouldn't drink the baking soda/water at the same time as taking the omeprazole. I made sure I did that hours apart from one another.
So about 10-12 weeks later my symptoms got much worse. It wasn't working. Nothing seemed to work.
So I went back to the doctor. They did another endoscopy and my throat is more swollen than the first. It's starting to swell up even higher around where my thyroid is.
I started having chest pains and it has become hard to swallow anything.
My heart rate gets insanely high in random occasions.
I feel a knock/thump whenever I swallow.
My throat is always hurting.
I am nauseous when I eat.
It's painful to eat or drink anything; I have lost almost 30lbs because of it.
So I have had a endoscopy twice now,
I got a barium swallow done and he told me I have acid reflux. probe test done,.,Blood work....How many more test need to be done?
I haven’t heard my voice in a year now. It's to the point where I am becoming depressed and I ignore talking to people. I ignore hanging out with friends, because if I talk to much my throat becomes incredibly sore to the point where I won't be able to sleep. I can't yell or whisper. I have one tone. If I yell then I’m pretty much out for the rest of the day because my throat hurts so badly.
I am thinking about going to the Mayo Clinic. Has anyone else been through this? Do you think they will be able to help? Could it be something else?
Im desperate.
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Have discussed the longterm use of these meds with my gastroenterologist at Mayo Clinic who debunked a lot of articles I've read about this. I have GERD with very small hiatal hernia. I do better on Omeprazole than I did Lansoprazole. Right now I will stay on it but continue to research and get other opinions. I do have to watch my foods and can get by not taking too much meds if I do that.
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3 ReactionsSame here. I’ve been on pantoprazole for 12 years for GERD and a small hiatal hernia. My brother died of esophageal cancer so always a worry there may be something genetic and I have other cancers. The meds healed my initially red esophagus to pink again. I asked my new GI if I should stop based on long term side effects I keep reading about. He told me there have been many additional clinical studies in the past decade that have debunked all the previous negative info. He said it’s perfectly safe for me. Stay the course. He also said because of the Internet and how nothing there ever goes away, the old now debunked info will constantly resurface.
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4 ReactionsI'm sorry about your brother. Wow I get why you are very concerned. You definitely want to keep the GERD at bay. That is pretty identical to what my doctor said. And no surprise, he just kept referring back to science and told me to stop reading so much on the internet (in his nice way lol).
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5 ReactionsIt will take about 1 month to get GERD under control on PPI med if u just started the treatment - 40 mg 1st thing in the morning - then wait 30 minutes before eating anything. For Gastritis. It also took 1 month on 40 mg in the morning and 40 mg 30 minutes before dinner - 80 mg total.
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2 ReactionsAre you taking a strong ppi? Or something like Pepcid?
I had my gall bladder removed in 2022 due to a big stone, which caused pancreatitis. I suffer with really bad acid reflux now and recently had an Upper GI endoscopy which revealed no esophageal abnormality, however there was a large amount of bile accumulated in the bottom part of my stomach which my doctor told me is one reason for my sever acid reflux. I changed from omeprazole to pantoprazole which did help the first 3 weeks after to switching to it, but now it's just as bad as before. I have made some changes with my eating habits and diet, but I am scared to eat anything now as it seems like whatever I eat I still get the acid reflux. The excess bile is the problem. Can anyone advise something for the excess bile?
It may take your body some time to adjust to not having a gallbladder. It took me 3 months to get my appetite back after having gallbladder removed. Drink Alkaline water every day - at least 16 oz a day + plus other drinks
. I get mine from Costco.
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1 ReactionThank you very much, I am definitely going to get some Alkaline water. What are the other drinks that you recommend?
Plain water and decaffeinated drinks.
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1 ReactionI take 40 mg Pantoprazole delayed release every morning
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