Asthma and Acid Reflux
Asthma is a disease that causes great distress and disability in its sufferers all over the world. This alone provided lots of misery to patients of asthma; however recently health professionals have found an increased connection between asthma and another condition called gastro esophageal reflux disease, or acid reflux. The combination of these two conditions increases the irritation caused by either disease on its own.
Asthma is usually started by many things like little cold breeze, a whiff of dust, stress and today, even acid reflux is found to trigger asthma attacks. Acid reflux occurs when the food that reaches the stomach emits acids to back up into the esophagus. This acid reflux can reach the throat, causing discomfort and other illnesses like asthma. A breakdown of the lower esophageal sphincter (LES) is attributed to the cause of acid reflux. This is because in normal people, once food is swallowed, the LES opens to permit food particles and liquid into the stomach.
This LES then closes to present return of the food into the esophagus. People suffering form acid reflux have a faulty LES that does not close or open at the right time. This leads to acid and some digested food returning to the esophagus, causing heartburn. The relation between acid reflux and asthma lies in the fact that doctor specializing in asthma have observed that asthmatic people usually have a faulty LES. Asthmatic people suffering from acid reflux have experienced relief from the symptoms of asthma when treated for acid reflux.
It is found that acid reflux triggers asthma in two ways. The first way is that acid reflux makes the patient breathe minute droplets of acid in their lungs, without their knowing it. This aggravates the pulmonary lining which in turn causes spasms in the bronchi, which in turn results in an asthma attack.
The second way acid reflux triggers asthma is that recurring incidents of acid reflux causes digestive acid to melt. This exposes some parts of crucial nerves that are connected to the lungs and this irritation tends to start the constriction of the airways, which in turn leads to an asthma attack.
It is possible for asthmatics to tell if their asthma attack gets triggered with an acid reflux if asthmatic conditions start after reaching adulthood. Even if asthma symptoms become more prominent after a meal, at night or lying down, then its cause can be attributed to acid reflux. And in such cases, usual asthma treatments don’t work.
So it can be seen that asthma and acid reflux have a connection. This leads to a need for a test in gastro esophageal reflux disease as the blend of these two diseases proves to be dangerous to its sufferer. It tends to hamper the quality of lifestyle, which gives a more important reason for early detection and treatment. The doctor conducts tests to measure acidity in the stomach, and if the result shows a tendency of acid reflux, the doctor will give the necessary treatment to cure this.