NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #26/NN_1992_26.iso/spool/sci/med/20627

Internet Message Format | 1992-11-08 | 1.8 KB

Path: sparky!uunet!ogicse!emory!athena.cs.uga.edu!aisun3.ai.uga.edu!mcovingt
From: [e-mail] (Michael Covington)
Newsgroups: sci.med
Subject: Re: indigestion
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 7 Nov 92 04:09:50 GMT
Article-I.D.: athena.1992Nov7.040950.29296
References: <[e-mail]>
Sender: [e-mail]
Organization: AI Programs, University of Georgia, Athens
Lines: 26

In article <[e-mail]> [e-mail] (Cathy Gaupo) writes:
>I've heard the commercials that if you have indigestion very
>often, you should see your doctor.  My boyfriend suffers a lot from it.
>Frequently, he has to take alka-setlzer or tums just to calm down the
>irritation and/or the flem.  So my question is what is the problem.

Those commercials are sponsored by Glaxo Pharmaceuticals to promote a very
expensive drug of theirs called Zantac which suppresses production of acid
in the stomach.  I'm on Zantac right now and it costs about $1 per pill.

Basically, anyone who has heartburn every day (not just after eating certain
things) probably has something wrong with the gastroesophageal sphincter
(the valve at the top of the stomach that keeps acid out of the esophagus).
"Something wrong" could be an ulcer, a hiatal hernia (part of stomach
sticking through the diaphragm), or simply an irritated area that needs to
heal, but won't heal until you give it several weeks without acid.

The things that helped me most was a very low fat diet (because fat tends
to open up the sphincter).  And of course Zantac.


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