Asthma As Related To Acid Reflux

Asthma is a chronic lung condition that is characterized by difficulties of breathing.  People who suffer from asthma have air passages that are hyper-responsive or extra sensitive.  In the event of an asthma attack, the airways become irritated and react by constricting and narrowing, causing increased resistance to airflow, and obstruction of the flow of air through the air passages to and from the lungs.

There is a study to indicate that the symptoms of asthma may worsen when stomach acid rises in your throat.  This situation is called gastro-oesophageal reflux disease, or GERD. It is ordinarily referred to as acid reflux. One result of acid reflux is painful heartburn which can be alleviated with the administration of antacid medicines. Specifically, these are special medications which neutralize stomach acids.  Acid reflux commonly affects overweight and older people.  However, it can also happen in children and people of all types.

There have been studies in which researchers have injected acid into the stomachs of asthma patients and it had a significant impact on their asthma resulting in worsened asthma symptoms. Evidence also suggest that asthma patients get acid reflux with greater frequency than people who do not suffer from asthma.  This is possibly due to great pressure changes present in the chest of people with asthma during the course of breathing.  This high pressure could cause liquid to pass through the esophagus from the stomach. In these cases, it would look like people who have asthma lose out twice: they suffer from asthma and they may suffer from acid reflux more often than people who do not suffer from asthma. There is, however, more to this story.  If acid reflux was a genuine and essential cause of increase in asthma severity, then acid reflux treatments should make the asthma better, however, this is generally not the case.

Read how this person cured his asthma the natural way

In the meantime, if you suffer from both  acid reflux and asthma, it could just be that careful management of your reflux will ease your breathing. If your asthma is severe and the cause is not known, some doctors might test to determine whether you have or had acid reflux by conducting tests to measure your stomach acidity.  If the result showed acid reflux tendencies, then your doctor would most likely try to improve your lungs by treating your stomach.

Tagged with: acid reflux • asthma attack

Filed under: Asthma