The surprising risks of long-term proton pump inhibitor use
A lot of my patients take proton pump inhibitors (PPIs). They generally work pretty well for their intended use. By limiting the secretion of gastric acid from the stomach, they can effectively blunt uncomfortable symptoms of erosive gastritis, gastroesophageal reflux disease, H. pylori infection, and peptic ulcers. However, without further evaluation, these medications are not
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The surprising risks of long-term proton pump inhibitor use originally appeared in KevinMD.com. (Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog)
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - June 18, 2023 Category: General Medicine Authors: Christopher Medrano, MD Tags: Meds Gastroenterology Source Type: blogs
The Curious Tale of PPI Trade Service Inflation
Alan ReynoldsAnother Wall Street Journal editorial once again confuses a rising year‐to‐year change in a price index with a monthly inflation rate for November. A chart supposedly “shows how wholesale price have risen every month but one this year on an annual basis.” This factoid is said to be “a monumental rebuke” to the Fe d, which (because of that “annual basis” trickery) is effectively blamed for both falling prices during COVID waves as well as rising prices during reopenings.The charted year ‐to‐year changes in the PPI donotshow that producer prices “have risen every month,...
Source: Cato-at-liberty - December 15, 2021 Category: American Health Authors: Alan Reynolds Source Type: blogs
Functional dyspepsia: Causes, treatments, and new directions
Functional dyspepsia (FD) is a common condition, loosely defined by some physicians as a stomach ache without a clear cause. More specifically, it is characterized by the feeling of fullness during or after a meal, or a burning sensation in the mid-upper abdomen, just below the rib cage (not necessarily associated with meals). The symptoms can be severe enough to interfere with finishing meals or participating in regular daily activities.
Those with FD often go through multiple tests like upper endoscopy, CT scan, and gastric emptying study. But despite often-severe symptoms, no clear cause (such as cancer, ulcer disease, ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - July 6, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Vikram Rangan, MD Tags: Digestive Disorders Mind body medicine Pain Management Source Type: blogs
Ranitidine (Zantac) recall expanded, many questions remain
Update: On April 1, 2020, the FDA requested manufacturers to withdraw all prescription and over-the-counter (OTC) ranitidine drugs (Zantac, others) from the market immediately, due to the presence of a contaminant known as N-Nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA). Although the FDA did not observe unacceptable levels of NDMA in many of the samples they tested, they have determined that the impurity in some ranitidine products increases over time and when stored at higher than room temperatures. As a result of this recall, ranitidine products will no longer be available for prescription or OTC use in the US.
The FDA is also advising co...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - April 2, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Joshua Gagne, PharmD, ScD Tags: Digestive Disorders Drugs and Supplements Source Type: blogs
C. difficile (C. diff): An urgent threat
Clostridioides (previously Clostridium) difficile (C. diff) is the most common cause of diarrhea among hospitalized patients and the most commonly reported bacteria causing infections in hospitals. In a 2019 report, the CDC referred to C. diff as “an urgent threat.”
Who is most at risk?
C. diff infection (CDI) occurs more commonly following antibiotic therapy or hospitalization, and among older adults or patients with weakened immune responses. In 2002, an epidemic strain of C. diff emerged, causing more severe disease with inflammation of the colon (colitis) and an increase in deaths. This strain adheres better to the...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - February 20, 2020 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Lou Ann Bruno-Murtha, DO Tags: Digestive Disorders Health Infectious diseases Prevention Source Type: blogs
Eosinophilic esophagitis: A new food-related allergic condition on the rise?
In the early 1990s, doctors began describing a new condition affecting the esophagus of patients who were predisposed to allergies including food allergy, asthma, and eczema, and who were having trouble swallowing. Today, we call this condition eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE).
What is EoE?
EoE is an allergic inflammation of the esophagus that causes a range of symptoms. Adolescents and adults most often experience it as difficulty swallowing, sometimes feeling like food moves too slowly through the esophagus and into the stomach. In some cases, food actually gets stuck (and may require urgent removal). Children and some adu...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - December 26, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: John Garber, MD Tags: Allergies Digestive Disorders Health Source Type: blogs
Thou Shalt Not Try to Outsmart Me
By HANS DUVEFELT, MD
Medical researchers and their groupies – early adopters, thoughtleaders, those easily influenced or whatever you want to call them – never seem to learn that when you try to outsmart Mother Nature or Our Heavenly Father, whichever appeals more to your world view, you usually get your hand slapped.
When I was a resident (1981-1984), I got penalized if I didn’t offer postmenopausal women estrogen-progesterone replacement therapy because it seemed obvious that if women with endogenous estrogen didn’t get many strokes or heart attacks and women without estrogen did, all we needed to do was ma...
Source: The Health Care Blog - December 20, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Christina Liu Tags: Medical Practice Physicians Primary Care Hans Duvefelt Source Type: blogs
Ranitidine (Zantac) recall expanded, many questions remain
As anticipated, recall of the popular heartburn medicine ranitidine (Zantac) has expanded. But we still have more questions than answers.
As I mentioned in my original blog post on this topic, the online pharmacy Valisure, which originally alerted the FDA to the issue, found what they called “extremely high levels” of the probable cancer-causing substance N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) in ranitidine products.
The FDA has indicated that its own preliminary testing has detected low levels of NDMA in ranitidine.
Testing methods may have influenced NMDA results
The FDA has clarified that the testing method that found the ...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - October 10, 2019 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Joshua Gagne, PharmD, ScD Tags: Digestive Disorders Drugs and Supplements Source Type: blogs
Where did all the magnesium go?
We pay special attention to restoration of magnesium in the Wheat Belly lifestyle. This is because magnesium deficiency is universal, affecting virtually everyone, is severe, and has substantial implications for health.
But why? Why has everyone become so depleted in magnesium in the modern world? There are five major reasons:
Water filtration—We filter our water out of necessity, since modern waterways are contaminated by sewage runoff, pesticide/herbicides, algal overgrowth, etc. So, rather than drinking from a nearby stream or river that runs freely over rocks and minerals rich in magnesium, we drink water filter...
Source: Wheat Belly Blog - May 30, 2019 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr. Davis Tags: Magnesium grain-free phytates undoctored wheat belly Source Type: blogs
Unexpected Lessons Learned From the Wheat Belly Lifestyle
In the seven years since the original Wheat Belly book hit bookstores and turned the nutritional world topsy-turvy and millions of people have engaged in a grain-free lifestyle, many unique lessons have been learned.
Even though I had engaged the practices of this lifestyle for a number of years and in thousands of people before I broadcast these ideas through books, expanding the audience to many more people yielded feedback on an enormous scale, new lessons that even surprised me.
Among the new lessons learned along the way:
Plantar fasciitis—I did not expect to have so many people report that this painful condition t...
Source: Wheat Belly Blog - October 17, 2018 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr. Davis Tags: News & Updates bowel flora gluten gluten-free grain-free grains Inflammation Weight Loss Source Type: blogs
MKSAP: 48-year-old man with a 4-week history of heartburn
Test your medicine knowledge with the MKSAP challenge, in partnership with the American College of Physicians.
A 48-year-old man is evaluated for a 4-week history of heartburn that awakens him at night. The symptoms occur about three times per week. He has been taking over-the-counter antacids with incomplete relief. Food triggers include coffee and spicy foods. He has not had unintentional weight loss or difficulty swallowing.
Physical examination and laboratory studies are normal.
Which of the following is the most appropriate next step in management?
A. Ambulatory esophageal pH monitoring
B. Esophageal manometry
C. Tr...
Source: Kevin, M.D. - Medical Weblog - September 11, 2018 Category: General Medicine Authors: < a href="https://www.kevinmd.com/blog/post-author/mksap" rel="tag" > mksap < /a > Tags: Conditions Gastroenterology Source Type: blogs
Concerns about adverse effects of PPIs: current status
(Source: Notes from Dr. RW)
Source: Notes from Dr. RW - September 4, 2018 Category: Internal Medicine Tags: gastroenterology pharmacology toxicology Source Type: blogs
Bowel disaster
Something like 60 to 100 million of us live with a severe form of dysbiosis called small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, or SIBO, in which bowel microorganisms have ascended up the ileum, jejunum, duodenum, and stomach, a massive onslaught of infection and inflammation that results in increased intestinal permeability and entry of bacterial lipopolysaccharide, LPS, and other factors into the bloodstream that massively increase body-wide inflammation, absolute bowel disaster.
But what sets this enormous disruption of human health in motion? Why would a perturbation of human health of such huge proportions get rooted in the...
Source: Wheat Belly Blog - September 2, 2018 Category: Cardiology Authors: Dr. Davis Tags: News & Updates bowel flora grain-free Inflammation sibo small intestinal wheat belly Source Type: blogs
Might Depression Be Linked to One of These Popular Medications?
If you’re taking beta blockers, certain kinds of anxiety drugs, certain types of painkillers (including ibuprofen), proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) (used to treat acid reflux), ACE inhibitors (used to treat high blood pressure), or anti-convulsant drugs, you may be at greater risk for depression. That’s according to a new, large-scale study published earlier this week in JAMA.
However, this was a correlational study, so it can’t say that these medications actually cause depression or not. It may be that people with greater health problems are more likely to take one of these medications and be depressed abo...
Source: World of Psychology - June 15, 2018 Category: Psychiatry & Psychology Authors: John M. Grohol, Psy.D. Tags: Depression General Medications Psychiatry Research Drugs cause depression popular medications Source Type: blogs
Apple cider vinegar … for heartburn?
I’ve always thought it sounded counterintuitive to use an acid to alleviate indigestion, but the number of times I’ve heard people treat their symptoms of heartburn with apple cider vinegar is too large to count. So, I decided to look into whether this strategy works, and to do some investigation about the idea behind its use. To my surprise, there is no research published in medical journals that addresses using raw apple cider vinegar to treat heartburn, despite widespread use and recommendations from blogs and websites.
What is heartburn?
Heartburn is most commonly caused by stomach acid contents traveling up into t...
Source: Harvard Health Blog - March 28, 2018 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Marcelo Campos, MD Tags: Complementary and alternative medicine Digestive Disorders Folk remedies Health Source Type: blogs
