I’ve been reading this thread, and just had to post regarding antacid use.
It is rare, but people with persistent heartburn due to acid reflux are at risk for a particularly nasty cancer of the esophagus called gastroesophageal carcinoma.
My uncle passed away from this last year at age 49, only 3 months after being diagnosed.
If you have constant heartburn, please, please stop self-medicating and see a doctor. Use of the new drugs like Prilosec can stop this, while antacids cannot.
I’m glad you brought that up, Morgainelf. I’ve heard of a (pre-cancerous) condition known as Barrett’s esophagus that can result from chronic reflux disease.
I don’t know about Prilosec, but I’ve seen advertisements for Nexium, claiming that the drug can heal damage done to the esophagus. By “damage”, I don’t know if they’re specifically referring to Barrett’s esophagus or not, does anyone here know? And does Prilosec also heal the damage? (Just curious, is all; to my knowledge I don’t actually have Barrett’s esophagus).
I used to do the antacid thing, ecause I had nighttime heartburn - heartburn so bad I would practically regurgitate and it would burn my throat severely. Then my gastroenterologist put me on Nexium, and no problems since.
There is really great news for all the self-medicators out there: Prilosec was very recently approved for over-the-counter by the FDC.
I’m a pretty heavy-duty, semi-regular ibuprofen user (that sounds like I should be in Ibuprofen Anonymous, or something, doesn’t it?) for several years.
After reading your post, I googled “Ibuprofen,” and found out that, yup, long-term use is linked to kidney damage. Somehow, I managed to be clueless enough not to think about the possibility that, if I keep doing this for several years more, I could be heading for trouble.
IANAD, but I Am A Wilderness First Aid Attendant. The other thing you chronic acid reflux sufferers should have checked is your heart. Especially if this is relatively sudden onset, for example, just starting up out of the blue X number of weeks/months/years ago.
One of the top symptoms of impending heart failure is a feeling of persistent heartburn. My dad was chewing Tums like mints for years - until his heart attack. Now that he’s been rotorooted (okay, angioplastied), he doesn’t have any more heartburn.
OH heck! That sounds scary, Cabbage - I do hope your treatment is helping a lot. Quite clever of you to assocatiate pain in thig with kidneys - I would have been too ignorant to work that one out.
I used to feel I had to use a lot of antacids - well, 'cos of pretty constant heartburn really. I had some inkling of the Alzheimer’s link, eventually, but - well - hard to do work well when acid inndigestion is biting you, although when in my own home, I preferred to use Sodium bicarb (I bet that had its own problems though).
So, I now know that if that situation comes back, I will give it only a little time, the hie me to a doc.
Hey, sorry to be bumping my own, over two year old thread; I know that’s generally frowned upon here. Just thought I’d give a bit of an update, not so much to be an attention whore–I also think the “warning” in my OP regarding excessive antacid use could bear being bumped just once more. Mods, close this thread now if you feel like it, I don’t care.
I’ve been going to see a nephrologist every 6 months to a year since then. If you know anything about creatinine levels and kidney function (of which I know only a bare minimum), my creatinine level when I entered the hospital back in 2003 was 6.3, which roughly translates to 15-20% normal kidney function. My last visit to the doctor was back in June; my creatinine level has come down to 1.2 (roughly 80% kidney function) and at my age (35) probably well within the normal range! Even the doctor was surprised, he never expected my kidneys to make such a recovery and is offering to give me a free ultrasound when I go back next month, simply because he’s curious to take another look at my kidneys now. After that, as far as he’s concerned, I no longer need to see a kidney doctor anymore!
Anyway, thanks again to all the well wishers I had here! Honestly, I never really changed my lifestyle/diet so much since then (other than quitting antacids–I take one Nexium a day now, which works pretty much perfectly for my acid reflux). I still drink, still smoke, and actually feel pretty damned lucky to have made the recovery I have.
To be honest, the personal details you posted are were kind of interesting. Prior to your posting I kinda-sorta have this mental picture of you and the the math mavens on the board as super clean living, neat as a pin, bicycle to work and eat healthy brown bag lunches Felix Unger types, not drinking, smoking, football playing guys.
