Heartburn

[soos]

I had an endoscopy 2 weeks ago to check for coeliac disease. The procedure went well and I suffered no immediate effects. However, I am experiencing heartburn the last 10 days, something I have not had before. It is particularly bad at night. The upper endoscopy was normal and I am awaiting the results of biopsies. Could the endoscopy have triggered this or is it another development of my B12 deficiency? Your thoughts/advice would be greatly welcomed. Thanks.

[Gambit62 Administrator]

not sure I can really help.

seems unlikely that the endoscopy would have caused the problems as i would have expected them to start immediately afterwards.

I had some really bad bouts of heartburn that got worse but seem to have settled down now that I have my B12 levels under control (by which I mean maintained as astronomic :)).

Do you know if you have PA as a cause of your B12 deficiency - even if you have had the tests for IFA and PCA come back negative the rate of false negatives still wouldn't rule it out as a cause. it could be that your stomach acidity has now got so low that it is causing the heartburn problem - the symptoms of low stomach acidity are pretty similar to those of high stomach acidity and there aren't any NHS treatments for low stomach acidity - just a tendency to treat as if it was high stomach acidity with PPIs which just make it worse.

You could try taking something acid with your food and see if that helps with the problem - suggest you at fbirder reply in this post for other ideas

healthunlocked.com/pasoc/po...

[soos in reply to Gambit62]

Thanks Gambit. I suspect you might be right with regard to low stomach acid.

[expatkerry in reply to soos]

I second this, I suffer from terrible heartburn and it's due to my low acidity. In my case I find too many carbs exacerbate the symptoms. If I go on a low carb diet the symptom subsides. I hope this helps, but I'm aware that one size doesn't fit all.

[soos in reply to expatkerry]

Thanks for you reply expatkerry. I have started taking apple cider vinegar to see if that helps. And, as I am a carboholic, I'll take on board your comment about carbs and see if that helps.

[blondie2505 in reply to soos]

Try apple cider vinegar for low stomach acid look it up.