Hygeia

Heartburn, named for the burning sensation felt near the heart, actually doesn’t have anything to do with the heart. Its cause is stomach acid that has come up into the esophagus. This happens when the valve situated between the stomach and the esophagus relaxes at the wrong time, thereby causing the burning feeling in the chest or throat associated with heart burn.

Great attention has been focused on helping heart burn patients and many theories as to the cause of heart burn have been put forth. The most likely cause to activate heart burn is typically thought to be specific foods or beverages, although which food causes the problem can be different for every individual sufferer. As a rule, about 10 percent of the total population and up to 25 percent of the pregnant population, experiences heart burn on any given day.

Frequent, recurring heart burn is known as acid reflux disease or Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD). Stomach acid was intended to remain in the stomach to aid in digestion. The lining of the esophagus is not able to resist stomach acid, causing as many as ten to fifteen percent of diagnosed GERD sufferersfar reaching however, and may even include such things as asthma, hoarseness, chronic cough, laryngitis or even non-cardiac chest pain.

Still the symptoms of heart burn may not be quite as terrible. Only about seven percent of those diagnosed with GERD suffer spells of heart burn daily and need treatment on a daily basis. About 30 to 40 percent of the remaining acid reflux disease patients experience heart burn only about once a month. This second group actually does not need daily treatments for acid reflux disease but should rather use them on an as-needed basis, thus saving themselves the cost of daily treatment and also of taking medicine every day.

The usual advised for heart burn and GERD sufferers includes some old stand-bys such as over the counter antacids and newer treatments including H2 blockers and proton pump inhibitors (PPI). Other do-it-yourself treatments are still used by many including taking an antacid or other medication before consuming a meal suspected to be a heart burn trigger, thus heading off heart burn before it has the opportunity to even begin. Lifting the head of the bed to keep stomach acid from moving up the esophagus appears to help some heart burn patients, as well as simply eating smaller meals and losing weight to relieve pressure on the stomach and esophagus.

An old reliable treatment, however, may still be the most effective at relieving heart burn and when drunk on a regular basis may even be helpful in healing the effects that stomach acid may have inflicted on the esophagus. That treatment, particularly beneficial for pregnant heart burn sufferers, is simply consuming milk daily. Easy to come by and fairly cheap, simple to use, a good source of calcium for your bones and pleasant to drink, imbibing milk could be the best advice for many of the heart burn sufferers out there.