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“Heart Burn- A sudden and terrible fire- like sensation in the pit of the stomach”
New Delhi, September 16, 2018:
Millions of people experience heart burn at some time. It’s a sudden and terrible fire-like sensation in the pit of the stomach. The discomfort is often accompanied by burping, or symptoms of bloating or gas. Sometimes an acid taste occurs in the mouth. Heartburn symptoms are often worse after eating a large oily or fried meal, using tobacco, or consuming alcohol or caffeine, and tend to improve after taking antacids. Even eating mints after a meal can trigger a reaction.
The stomach contains very strong acids. Heartburn, or reflux, is a form of indigestion that occurs when acid and digestive juices flow back up from the stomach into the oesophagus. That’s the tube through which food passes going from your mouth to your stomach. It doesn’t have a protective lining, so when acidic food comes back up it causes inflammation and pain. The problem stems from a muscle that may be weak or may relax at inappropriate times. It’s called the lower oesophageal sphincter and it’s located between your stomach and your oesophagus. If it doesn’t close quickly enough, it can’t prevent the acid backwash. That results in heartburn, and frequent acid reflux could mean that you may have gastro-oesophageal reflux disease. Pregnant women can suffer heartburn. Elevated levels of the hormone progesterone cause a temporary weakness in the muscle.
Heart burn is not normal and it affects everything you do including your sleep. Left untreated, chronic heartburn can lead to ulcers and to cancer of the oesophagus. Symptoms of heartburn can include a burning or painful sensation in the upper chest behind the breastbone, a sour taste in the mouth, belching, coughing, and wheezing, difficulty in sleeping after eating, regurgitation, and chronic hoarseness or sore throat. The most common therapy contains aluminium or magnesium (Milk of Magnesia), and relieves symptoms in five to 15 minutes, but the effects don’t last beyond an hour. It neutralises stomach acids, but doesn’t prevent heartburn.
Most of the heartburn is caused by what you take into the body. Change your diet, lose weight, stop smoking (on a full stomach, smoking increases the risk of heartburn), avoid alcohol, coffee and carbonated drinks, eat more vegetables. Exercise, but avoid bending from the waist. Eat acid reducers, also known as H2 blockers, and don’t slouch while eating. Don’t have beverages with caffeine, alcohol, garlic, chocolate, citrus fruits, tomatoes.
Now come to my favourite rant: don’t drink milk at all. The entire group of dairy foods, or food that contains any form of dairy – cakes, pastries, kadi, yoghurt, paneer, buttermilk, cheese – all of them cause acid reflux symptoms. The symbol pH is used to denote acidity; Milk has a pH of 6.7 and is therefore slightly acidic.
And especially if you are suffering from a bout of heart burn. Old fashioned doctors still prescribe milk- which is like prescribing cobra venom to counteract a bite from a snake. People often drink cold milk to provide relief for heartburn and decrease stomach acid production. Milk might feel nice and cool going down, but it actually contains fats and proteins that cause your stomach to secrete MORE acid and make your heartburn worse.
Understand the science of it: Why does it feel good in the beginning by calming the symptoms of heart burn? Milk is an acidifying animal protein. Like any other animal derived protein-rich food, milk can damage the kidneys with this acid load. This triggers a protective biological reaction to neutralize all the damaging acidic protein before it reaches the kidneys.
The body is designed for survival. It has to protect the kidneys and urinary tract because they are essential to survival. And the most readily available source of acid neutralizer is in the bones. So it takes calcium out of the bones and into your stomach and sacrifices your bone density to save your vital organs. Milk has its own calcium as well. Between them, the calcium neutralises the acid in the stomach for a few minutes. But because milk is acid it adds to the heart burn once the superficial effect has worn off. Foods high in fat – as milk is -often increase acid reflux by increasing stomach acid production.
Though heartburn triggers can vary, certain food and drinks are more prone to relax/weaken the muscle between the stomach and oesophagus triggering acid reflux. These include foods containing saturated fat, such as whole milk, yogurt, cheese, cream, ice cream. Processed meat, beef and mutton, chicken with its skin on, any curried form of meat, oils and sweets including chocolate, corn and potato chips, creamy and oily salad dressings, fried or fatty food in general.
Don’t think that by shifting from whole milk to skimmed milk, you will get any relief; or by shifting from mutton to fish. Perhaps very slightly and again, only for a little while.
Drinking milk before bedtime is a folk remedy for people who suffer from acid reflux and heartburn during the night. Don’t do it. It’s better to sleep on an empty stomach or have a few wheat crackers before bedtime. And drink as much water as you can. Waking and before sleeping.
Whenever you have heart burn, or you want to avoid it, do two things: stand up and chew gum. This, scientists say, raises the level of saliva and bicarbonate – a naturally-occurring antacid in saliva – which neutralises damaging acids in the digestive system. Elevate the head of the bed at night.
Maneka Sanjay Gandhi
To join the animal welfare movement contact gandhim@nic.in, www.peopleforanimalsindia.org
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