Gastro-esophageal reflux disease, or GERD, has been known by many names over the course of time, but the one that is most known is heartburn. When stomach acid gets into the esophagus, it can create havoc, leading to an intense burning pain between the chest and throat. Additionally, it can create a chronic cough or need to clear the throat. Acid in the esophagus is a problem that needs a solution. Unfortunately, the solution modern medicine is giving us today does nothing to address the real problem, and sets the patient up for significant health problems down the road.
There are four basic reasons why the juices from the stomach, which are highly acidic, can get into the esophagus, and none of them have to do with an excess of acid.
1. You can have less tone in the cardiac sphincter, which is the muscle that is supposed to clamp down tightly and keep things in the stomach from moving back up.
2. There is a possibility that a hiatal hernia exists, which is where part of the stomach ends up above the diaphragm, thus pushing juices back into the esophagus.
3. The stomach can be slow to empty, keeping foodstuffs around and pushing things upwards.
4. You can have things get stuck in the esophagus from the cardiac sphincter not allowing normal movement of food into the stomach.
While there are other obscure reasons for GERD symptoms to appear, these four are the most common, and have absolutely nothing to do with medicine's treatment, which is to eradicate stomach acid, and have everything to do with acid simply being in the wrong place.
In conventional medicine today, the treatment for GERD is a variety of medications, all of which either slow the production of stomach acid, or prevent its formation entirely. While this seems like a common sense solution to some, their "cure" is leading to a whole host of problems for these patients.
Stomach acid is vital for our normal function. Without it, we accelerate our pace to the grave. Here are some of the vital roles this solution plays in our system:
1. It's our first line of defense against any bugs which try to enter our intestinal system.
2. It begins the protein digestion pathway.
3. It binds minerals like calcium, magnesium, iron, zinc, and copper for later absorption.
4. It is necessary to stimulate the production of bicarbonate and enzymes in the small intestine for food breakdown.
5. It creates a neural reflex which makes the cardiac sphincter have more pucker power.
6. It limits the growth of H. pylori, which is a bug in our stomach that can lead to ulcers.
7. It's production takes a tremendous amount of energy.
As we can see, the acid in our stomach has some pretty important roles to play. There's a reason it is there, and by suppressing it, medicine creates very significant disease. Right on the package of any GERD medication is a warning for those that have any osteoporosis risk. Taking H2 blockers or proton pump inhibitors will wipe out your ability to absorb calcium, thus increasing the risk of osteoporosis. We also need protein for the formation of bone as well as almost all tissue repair, and we have a hard time getting that protein without normal amounts of acid. Lower stomach acid actually increases our risk of ulcer formation, due to the increased population of H. pylori. To say the least, without a healthy amount of stomach acid, we will quickly begin to deteriorate.
Have you ever looked at the diets of elderly women? They begin be eliminating beef (which is the most dense protein and hardest to digest) because it upsets their stomach. It is upsetting to their stomach because they don't have enough acid to start the protein digestion pathway, and the food sits in the stomach for too long, putrefying instead of digesting. Putrefaction leads to gas formation which can lead to acid in the esophagus, i.e. heartburn or GERD. Pretty soon pork follows suit, as eventually does poultry. Before long, fish creates problems as well, and their diet starts to be limited to soups and broths, which have very little protein. In the mean time, their body cannot repair, and rapidly begins to break down, all because they are deficient in stomach acid.
I am always baffled when I look at this condition and medicine's treatment of it, since their own books tell us what the problem most likely is. According to Guyton's Textbook of Physiology (the medical "bible" of physiology), from the age of 20 to 40, our stomach acid production decreases by 50%, and from 40 to 60 it goes down 50% more. That means that the average 60 year old has about 25% of the stomach acid production that they did when they were 20. Is it any wonder we see accelerated aging after 40? Not when you consider this. If we then go back and look at the mechanism, we see that more than likely, patients with GERD actually have a stomach acid deficiency, and because of this, it ends up in the wrong place - the esophagus. Why then, if the texts tell us this is the problem, are we suppressing the acid production, leading to accelerated deterioration of the patient? My cynical side tells me to follow the money. When a new drug has been discovered, we must find a condition for it to treat. Unfortunately for the patients who undergo this drug therapy, getting off of it is extremely difficult. If stopped quickly, it produces a rebound effect, and the patient often ends up with worse symptoms than they had initially.
In my practice, instead of stopping the production of this vital acid, I work instead to increase its production. I will have my patients do a stomach acid challenge test, and rarely to I find someone over 40 who has adequate acid production. Then it is simply a matter of replacement in a manner that teaches the stomach how to do things properly, and eventually, it begins to make the acid again on its own. In the mean time, the patients don't get GERD (because we addressed the problem), they begin to heal and make new bone, and they feel so much better.
Modern medicine is lacking in common sense in many of its treatments, but nowhere is it more obvious than when looking at GERD. If they were to read their own books and apply it to their practice, they would see the fallacy of what they are doing. Instead, they continue to accelerate the degeneration of their patients, only leading them to be more reliant on medications, since their function will continue to decrease as long as they take these worthless medications.
Look for future blogs that will give more information and insights into improving your health with natural health care. You can also visit my website, like me on Facebook, or follow me on Twitter.
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