Acid Reflux: Meaning and Causes

Resulting clinical conditions from Acid reflux have been reported by researchers to account for the most outpatient diagnoses and complaint seen by most medical professionals.


What is Acid Reflux?
Acid reflux is a clinical condition accompanied by a burning pain (popularly known as heartburn) in the lower part of the chest. This is as a result of backflow of acid into the food pipe.

How Does This Happen?
Imagine a long tube as your oesophagus, this tube is inserted into a bucket (stomach). At the junction of contact between the oesophagus and stomach, there is a valve called the lower oesophagal sphincter (LES) which normally closes as soon as food passes through it to prevent backflow into the oesophagus (food pipe). If this valve is not closed, the acid produced by the stomach can flow into the oesophagus causing symptoms like heartburn. And when this happens frequently more than twice a week, it may be diagnosed as gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD).

Causes of Acid Reflux
Most cases of acid reflux are either related to lifestyle or eating habit with few resulting from wrong anatomical morphology. Some of the causes include;

•    Hiatal Hernia

•    Large meals consumption

•    Lying down immediately after eating

•    Obese

•    Eating a heavy meal

•    Eating close to bedtime especially snacking

•    Eating foods like tomato, chocolate, garlic, onions, or spicy foods

•    Drinking alcohol and coffee

•    Smoking

•    Pregnancy

•    Certain medications like ibuprofen and aspirin.

Acid Reflux Treatments
Except in extreme cases such as when caused by Hiatal Hernia, the fastest treatment of Acid reflux is using acid reflux tablets such as lansoprazole which you can get from an online pharmacy like Pharmacy Planet at an affordable price. You have to be careful thou when you decide to buy lansoprazole online UK to avoid getting a fake medication.