Problems with acid reflux medication

The last few days I have been not quite sticking to my diet properly and have started to get frequent bouts of acid reflux again. This has led me to taking my medication all week and further looking at what problems acid reflux medication can bring by taking medication over a long period. What I have found is quite scary.

The stomach normally controls the amount of acid we produce naturally and adjusts to accommodate what we are doing. If we take in the wrong food or eat improperly i.e. eat to fast or not chew our food correctly, it upsets the balance of our stomach and also the functions of the valves which control the movement of food both into and out of the stomach.

Digestion works when certain conditions are triggered in the stomach. The normal level of the stomach has a ph level of approximately 3-4. A ph reading of 1 is very acidic and a ph reading of 8 is very alkaline. Normally when food enters the stomach it has a higher ph and this triggers the release of a hormone called Gastrin.

Gastrin is used by the body to maintain the amount of acid in the stomach and is released from cells called G cells in the lining of your stomach. When Gastrin is released it stimulates other cells called parietal cells which secrets hydrochloric acid (hcl) into the stomach, which is our stomach acid. It also releases a digestive enzyme called Pepsin. The hcl is an ideal working environment for the Pepsin to do its work in digesting food.

This process turns our food into the energy we require, but the Gastrin also stimulates the stomach muscles which send any waste product into the duodenum and on to the small intestine.

When you have acid reflux disease and take Proton Pump Inhibitors like myself you are in effect stopping the production of stomach acid. This imbalance of stomach acid means your stomach tries to compensate and produce more Gastrin which in turn tries to produce more acid which it cannot do, but the levels of Gastrin starts to rise. The Gastrin levels in patients, who take Omeprazole the same drug I take, have been measured to be 2-4 times the baseline level after 2-4 months.

Producing high levels of Gastrin can lead to a condition called hypergastrinemia. This is a well-recognized cause of a severe disease known as Zollinger-Ellison syndrome, a rare disorder that causes tumors in the pancreas and duodenum and ulcers in the stomach and duodenum. Up to half of these tumors can be malignant and lead to stomach cancer.

By blocking the production of stomach acid before or after eating with drugs, the G cells that produce Gastrin believe there is not enough acid production and so keep producing more Gastrin. Therefore the long term use of acid reflux medication like Proton Pump Inhibitors can put you at risk of stomach cancer.

This is a sort of vicious circle as treating acid reflux disease or GERD is needed and is long term. But using conventional medicine, which was great in my own case for a while now has an added worry that it could create an even worse disaster if I stay on it long term. The alternatives are to either look at natural cures for heartburn and acid reflux or look at having surgery.