You know how I said that Ben hasn't been well lately? Last week he had some blood work done and that didn't appear to tell us anything about his abdominal pain. Today he had an upper GI scope done (doc puts a lighted camera down your throat and esophagus to take pictures of your esophageal lining and stomach lining/acids). The results were not what we had hoped for. While the results do give us a diagnosis, we had hoped he was just acidy. Apparently, over the years all his acid has been eating away at his esophageal lining, and his doctor has preliminarily diagnosed Ben with Barrett's Esophagus.
Now, this is not a final diagnosis, but his doctor is a gastro-intestinal specialist, and I am inclined to trust his judgement. This diagnosis means a few things...
1) Ben will be on some sort of PPI medication (Nexium, for example) for the rest of his life.
2) He needs to lose some weight around his middle, those extra pounds are pushing stomach acids into his esophagus at night and when he lies down.
3) He needs to get scoped on a regular basis to make sure that his Barrett's does not turn into esophageal cancer.
4) Diet changes... no soda, fewer acidy foods such as tomatos, oranges, etc.
So today has been a rather big day. I'm worried for him, but he's in good shape now, and we intend to help keep him that way.
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2 comments:
I'm sorry to hear about Ben's condition. At least now you have something to go on. And you have an excuse to find all kids of new low-acid yummy recipes. Best of luck!
Already started looking... I went online and found some websites that gave us a good idea of what foods are recommended for someone with his condition, what foods can be consumed in moderation, and what foods he needs to avoid. So that's been a big help. We also know that he needs to be on a low-fat diet as well (fatty and fried foods aggravate his stomach), so I'm going to be baking chicken and fish more, less beef.
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