#How Is Gastritis Diagnosed

[gofitnesspro]

Understanding Gastritis: Causes, Symptoms, And Treatments

Gastritis is a condition that inflames the belly lining (the mucosa), inflicting belly aches, indigestion (dyspepsia), bloating, and nausea. It can be acute or chronic. Medications and dietary modifications can lessen stomach acid and reduce gastritis symptoms. Why Should You Understand Gastritis? If left untreated, gastritis can lead to several complications increasing your risk of stomach…

[barnbridges]

every person who says self diagnosis is bad has never actually dealt with a doctor enough times.

[northgazaupdates]

Little Joan needs surgery!!!

Joan Al-Habil is has been repeatedly hospitalized due to severe gastrointestinal problems and overwhelming fatigue. This poor girl has been to multiple facilities and seen multiple doctors, undergone extensive testing (as extensive as is possible in Gaza’s collapsed medical system), even having to endure an unsedated endoscopy, which I know from personal experience is extremely uncomfortable.

She has now been diagnosed with severe gastritis due to starvation and hazardous living conditions. Remember, she and her family are living on the streets, which are cold and wet due to winter rain. Homelessness, stress, exposure to the elements, her previous injury when the IOF firebombed her tent, and malnutrition all conspire to sap little Joan of her strength.

Her condition is so serious that she now requires surgery. Gastritis very rarely requires surgery to treat, so this is an indication of how dire her situation is. In addition to surgery, she is going to need treatment to manage her symptoms.

The cost of this is very very high. One consultation alone cost $650 USD. Joan’s family is going to need your support to pay for her treatment.

Please, this little girl is in so much pain and misery. Her parents are watching her waste away as her condition worsens daily.

You can help Joan get her surgery and treatment ASAP! Her parents Maha @mahafamily and Ahmed @ahmed-family-1 recreated their GFM after their previous campaign was arbitrarily terminated. You can share this campaign by copy-pasting this link (https://gofund.me/85a1b400) in your own Tumblr posts and all across your social media accounts.

If you plan to spend any money for the holiday season, please save some back and send it to Joan. She is in absolute misery, but your support will go a long way toward extending and improving her life.

Please help this innocent little girl get the help she needs!!

Link to share: https://gofund.me/85a1b400

Link to donate:

[cannabiscomrade]

It's Gastroparesis Awareness Month

Hi! I have gastroparesis and I'm an insufferable know-it-all so let's talk about it!

Gastroparesis, or a paralyzed stomach, is a condition that causes delayed gastric emptying.

This can cause a range of symptoms and complications:

nausea

vomiting

early satiety/fullness

upper gastric pain

heartburn

malabsorption

dehydration

malnutrition

Gastroparesis can be treated by a gastroenterologist, but often needs to be managed by a motility specialist due to a lot of misconceptions about the condition. Providers, especially in the emergency department, will commonly misdiagnose gastroparesis as cannabis-hyperemesis syndome, cyclic vomiting syndrome, gastritis, food poisoning, etc.

There are several commonly known causes of gastroparesis like vagus nerve damage from diabetes, injury to the stomach, and stomach surgery like hernia repair or bariatric surgery. There are also idiopathic cases with no known cause. Other causes of gastroparesis are:

Connective tissue disorders like HSD and EDS (commonly hEDS and cEDS)

Post-viral (like COVID, viral gastritis, mononucleosis/Epstein-Barr)

Restrictive eating disorders

Autoimmune diseases like Systemic sclerosis (scleroderma), Lupus, Hashimoto's

Central nervous system disorders

Gastroparesis also has common comorbidities with conditions like:

POTS and other forms of dysautonomia (POTS, EDS, and gastroparesis are a common triad of diagnoses)

MCAS

SMAS (which can also present with similar symptoms to GP)

Intestinal dysmotility and esophageal dysmotility disorders (known as global dysmotility)

PCOS with insulin resistance

Endometriosis

SIBO/SIFO

Chronic intestinal pseudo-obstruction

Migraines

Certain medications like Ozempic and other drugs in that class act on the digestive system to delay gastric emptying, which has caused people to be diagnosed with gastroparesis. Some people report that their cases have not gone away since stopping the medication, others report feeling better after stopping. Other drugs like opiates and narcotics can cause delayed gastric and intestinal motility as well, but these are commonly known side effects of those painkiller classes.

Gastroparesis is classed based on severity and graded based on how you respond to treatment.

Severity of delay ranges from mild to very severe, and this is based on your actual stomach retention calculated at 4 hours into a gastric emptying study.

The grading scale ranges from one to three, one being mild and three being gastric failure.

There is no consistent single treatment that is proven to work for gastroparesis, and there is no cure. Treatments can consist of:

Diet changes (3 Step Gastroparesis Diet, liquid diet, oral sole source nutrition)

Prokinetic (motility stimulating) drugs

Anti-nausea medications

Proton-pump inhibitors

Gastric stimulator/gastric pacemaker

Pyloric botox and dilation

G-POEM/pyloroplasty

Post-pyloric tube feeding

Gastric venting/draining

Parenteral nutrition

IV fluids

Other surgical interventions like gastrectomy or rarely, transplant

Gastroparesis is a terrible disease and I hope that if any of these symptoms resonate with you that you can get checked out. I was misdiagnosed for a long time before getting a proper gastroparesis diagnosis, and all it took was a gastric emptying study. This is ESPECIALLY true if you're having post-COVID gastrointestinal problems that are not improving. I almost died from starvation ketoacidosis because of how serious my GP got in a short period of time post-COVID (I had GP before COVID), and now I'm tube reliant for all my nutrition and hydration.

Stay safe friends!

[kaydens-stuff]

Sometimes I get so caught up in the bad moments that I don't realize how far I've come in my chronic pain journey.

Earlier this year I went to the ER consistently once or twice a week because of how bad my chronic migraines were (and I say this with the knowledge that everyone here has about how horrible and last resource de ER is).

In February I was diagnosed with juvenile arthritis and it was a bad time. I was in the hospital and going from one doctor to another twice as much, because no one wants to treat chronically ill teens.

And when I finally believed that everything was getting better I actually got worse again. I was diagnosed with chronic gastritis among other gastrointestinal issues, and some of the ER staff started to know me by name. But doctors said that it was anxiety and nobody wanted to treat me, while I was going through the worst months of my life. Then I was hospitalized and bedbound for weeks.

And looking back I remember how exhausting it felt to do anything. How the simple thought of going outside made me tired. How I didn't celebrate my birthday because that meant doing stuff, and I wanted to cry just thinking about how much that would hurt (and I love my birthday). And, yes, some days it still feels that way, but now I look at my life and I see how I go to class consistently (when last year I didn't go to school at all), how I hang out with my friends every week and how I even use public transport some days (my worst nightmare some months ago), and I feel so happy seeing how much I've improved.

So, this is a reminder for all the sad and frustrated chronically ill: as bad as everything seems now, you are going to feel better, and there will still be very bad days, but there will also be great days to compensate.

[oneshortdamnfuse]

I like how when my dad went to the ER for chest and abdominal pain, they ran multiple tests including an ECG, X Ray and CT scan, gave him a double dose of pain medicine, and diagnosed him with gastritis within five hours, sending him home with prescriptions and a detailed sheet on how to deal with it.

When I went to the ER with chest and abdominal pain, they did an ECG. Noted it was "normal," and then left me to writhe there in pain for hours with no pain relief and no additional tests other than a physician coming over to interrogate me on what could be causing my anxiety and I went home with no diagnosis, endured severe disabling attacks for an entire year until I met with a female doctor who ordered additional tests that diagnosed that my gallbladder was failing and my intestines were on the wrong side of my body and even then when I went to a consultation with a surgeon, they asked me what made me think my gallbladder was failing even though I had been told so through ultrasound and they told me not to worry so much about my intestines being on the wrong side of my body even though I had chronic abdominal pain and vitamin deficiencies.

Love that.

[mueritos]

Another joins the Autistic IBS sufferer gang 🤝 it’s funny how it’s so common with us lmao

its hilariously also a trans thing LOL....my therapist thinks I developed IBS in my youth (diagnosed with ibs/gastritis since 4th grade) because I was dealing with gender dysphoria but just didnt know it (and now im thinking it may have also been autism shit too). but yes it is incredibly common for these 2 populations (trans and autistic) to have gastrointestinal issues

[bloominglix]

Hi guys, I'm so sorry i've not been too active.

(Yes i'm still a stay dw)

My life's been getting harder and harder. I'll tell you a bit. If you read this, please do it until the end. 🧸🩹

I've been feeling super sick for no apparent reason since i was very young, all my blood tests and medical exams in general showing that nothing's wrong with me. This year the doctors just told me i have "Chronic Gastritis", and that my vitamin B12 deficiency has no relation to it.

So i had to start doing my own research, and investigating while considering all my symptoms, i reached the conclusion (that i'm 99,9999% sure of) that it might be a form of Dysautonomia, a chronic illness.

It's super hard to get diagnosed for this, since there's barely a few doctors that know about Dysautonomia well enough to do it.

What 's making it worse for me, is that because of my symptoms I can't find a job in the areas i'm good at. Can't work a job related to what i studied (international gastronomy) because i would pass out for standing for too long.

Even though I'm really good at speaking English (2nd language), can translate things easily and I'm good at proofreading and editing documents, people won't hire me because I couldn't study translation. I can draw! good??? i don't think so, though i try my best, but i don't think it's worth selling or doing comissions.

Can't find a job in a supermarket, small store or a convenience store, since i can't carry heavy stuff, and they ask for experience for a cashier gig. I can get dizzy and dehydrated in any moment, and pass out, throw up, and my body starts to tremble.

Yes, i get tremors from it, my body and limbs start shaking all over the place no matter what i'm doing. It's hard to even put on my shoes, my legs start shaking and i can't push my feet into them, i have to literally grab my legs to control the tremors and take my time to put on the shoes and slippers.

My mom just found a job after job hunting for over 9 months, and my dad's been unemployed for a year now. I need to make money so i can help my mom pay for things, and i'm really getting annoyed at how people think i'm jobless and resting because i want to and that i'm "faking being sick" 😐

Also, this might sound stupid for some of you, but for the first time Stray Kids are coming to Chile, and it might be the only chance i have to see them in concert here. It'd be my first concert ever. I have money for a ticket, but I'd be using all my savings on it (already spent some of it on medical bills). Skz have helped me so much through this and through hard times, I can't not see them, I'd regret it my entire life if I let this chance pass.

If you guys have any idea of what kind of jobs i can do, remotly or please tell me, i need ideas ㅠㅠ love you guys ♡

[ohu-thia]

Chronic Gastritis

I've liked kawaii medicalcore / menhera for years but irl i hate dealing with doctors and health problems

I've dealt with a mystery health issue that causes severe stomach pain for over 9 months. In total I've lost 80lbs from not being able to eat anything + no appetite. Most of it was rapidly lost over the course of a few months. The rapid weight loss and being bed bound repeatedly for about a week straight each time caused my muscles to atrophy. I'm slowly building back my strength but I'm no where near how I used to be.

I couldn't even get in for an appointment for over half a year. Couldn't get medical treatment so I had to treat myself, I found a diet through painful trial and basically guessing, causing excruciating flair-ups over and over...Well I finally I got to see doctors and after testing negative for other stuff I got an upper endoscopy.

I got diagnosed with Chronic Gastritis. This can last years, and some people say theirs never went away fully. Mine was caused by an NSAID (Meloxicam) that I was prescribed for years to treat a messed up back, the pills ate my stomach lining up. It's a miracle I didn't get internal bleeding from this since I kept taking them not knowing it was the cause. Would have been nice to see a doctor in a reasonable amount of time, the first thing he did was take me off of it.

I can't eat most foods. What I can eat, I don't really care for. Make one mistake and it causes excruciating pain, and you are set back to day one with healing. Eating other people's cooking is a gamble...I got a surprise with bread a little under a month ago.

Chronic Gastritis fact: There's another type of Chronic Gastritis caused by a bacteria called Helicobacter pylori and it's the only bacteria that is known to cause cancer. It's a major risk factor for Gastric cancer. 60% of the world's population is infected with it, although it usually is asymptomatic and benign.

I tested negative for it though with a breath test, but I'm getting retested along with the other stuff they're checking with my biopsies. I was supposed to get the results in a week but they never bothered to call...The medical system in the US is beyond broken. Guess I'm going to hear it at my follow-up?

posting this bc boogie2988 lol

also here's pictures of my insides...im spoiler-ing it bc its literally my insides

its cool they gave me this I usually have to beg for photos...I wonder where I put that photo of my face x-rayed

[thehypnone]

I forgot to add this in the first one, but a continuation to my thoughts. As someone who lives in a country with a... decent... (sometimes, as I had to beg my gp for 5 years to send me to specialists for my stomach pains (I have been diagnosed with gastritis) and headaches (no clue why for now but getting tests done, my neurologist thinks I might've had a brain infection... not scary at all and I refuse to believe for now) and her the entire time blaming it on a "growing organism") medical system, I feel absolutely no jealousy towards you. Everyone deals how they can in their situation and makes the best of what they can. Needing or taking medication isn't something people brag about, and neither are illnesses. It's problems that people face day to day and often for the rest of their lives. In these things there's no space for jealousy or bragging. People who think there is, must be out of their damn minds.

Keep living your life how you want, i wish you all the best and let the haters hate. <3

-the new anon (i'm not putting this one as anon bc I do not care if people come for me for what I said. I will stand for my opinions.)

I genuinely don't know what else I could say here apart from thank you for saying this, again <3

[smolgayartnerd]

Things are,, hard. Right now. This entire week has had me crying a lot because my poor bby cat is sick. She has trouble eating. She has spent the past few days in the hospital and when she gets out she will need a long-term prescription diet because she was just diagnosed with IBD (Inflammatory Bowel Disease).

They were supposed to discharge her today and I was really excited to take her home. Unfortunately when they took her off her appetite stimulants (she was having gastritis all week) she wasn't eating as much as they were hoping. They said they can either give her steroids or do a surgical biopsy to check for things like viruses or cancer. I can't afford the surgery so I opted for stimulants, and I'm kinda banking on them working. I don't want to think about what I might have to do if they don't work.

I'm currently unemployed and am relying on family money/trust. I am very privileged to have gotten this far thanks to those things. Most people don't get that with their pets. That said, my/the family's money is not limitless so I don't think I can do anything if these steroids don't work.

What really upsets me most aside from the possibility of losing my cat who is honestly like a child to me, is that my aunt (who manages mine and my mother's trust funds since we are both disabled) kinda implied that she doesn't want me getting another cat regardless of whether or not my current cat is okay. I live alone. Because I'm autistic I have had a lot of trouble dealing with my own habits and having roommates. That said, like most people I do get lonely on some level and having a cat has really helped me fill that void for the most part.

I'm not asking anyone for anything. Again, I recognize my own privilege to have been able to get this far in treating my baby. Last night I saw a post of someone asking for help to afford the $60 to collect their cat's ashes because she got sick and died so suddenly. I didn't exactly know whether or not that post was being legit. I know the "sick cat" thing is a common Tumblr scam. I am not going to accuse that person of anything, but I also had no way of really knowing how legit they are. If this is for real though, I hope I can find them again and maybe give them a little bit because I know how difficult this all is. I feel lucky to have noticed my baby's declining health as soon as I did.

I kinda just wanted somewhere to vent/cry about all this. I want the week to be over.

[ninisnutrition]

The first question: why?

I recently thought a lot about how I can improve my health. Dealing with autoimmune conditions (hashimoto thyreoiditis diagnosed in 2011 + a possible gastritis type A) make my daily life more difficult. In the past I already tried to change my diet to ease my symptoms but the results are chastening.

Am I missing something? To get a better view at my current lifestyle I decided to share my findings and hope to figure out which parts are the main reasons I still struggle with several symptoms.

Now, let me introduce me: I´m currently 26 years old, I was born in 1997 and suffer from my thyroid issues since 2007. It started with unspecific symptoms like fatigue, a strong feeling of thirst, anxiety and panic attacks. My parents divorced in 2005 so my parents and my whole surroudings thought it was a mental problem. It took 2 years to diagnosed a hypothyroidism and 2 more years to realize, that the hypothyroidism results from a hashimoto thyroiditits.

My anxiety and panic attacks got worse and worse over this time. I hardly left my home, school was difficult, grocery shopping was hell. My circle got smaller and smaller, I refused to leave my room and spend whole nights awake due to bad panic attacks.

Between 2009 and 2018 I saw more than 5 differents psychotherapists and spend more than 5 months in 2 hospitals to get treat my mental issues. There were different approaches how to soothe my illness, which I would like to go into later.

In 2018 I had my last therapy session and since that I had my life - more or less - under my control, not my anxiety´s control. This was an important step to lead a self-determinde life, after being under the influence of untreated diseases.

I started a traineeship in retail salesment and in 2021 I gratuated. But this isn´t the life I want for me. I can´t imagine that I will stay in retail for the rest of my life. So I researched how I can reach the kind of lifestyle I want for myself. For a better understanding in general I thought it would be a good idea to journal my life in a kind of blog. Even if no one might ever read this but it should give me a kind of alignment on my journey to become the best version of myself.

So, how should this work? I thought about mixing stories from my past with (my own) new experiences and knowledge + the one or another recipe; maybe, it´s just an abstract idea in my head, I´m not 100% sure how this will work out for me, let´s see, what the future holds.

[beautifulreflections]

Blog Post 4: Looking back to move forward.

Blog Post 4: Looking back to move forward.

This week I’m remembering the why. I truly believe your willpower will only be as strong as your why. So, I’m taking you back to my why, which takes us back almost six years to the birth of my second son. It was a beautiful day, when He was born with His big brown eyes and brown hair making me the proud mom of two healthy boys. Except I still remember the nurse coming in every hour and pricking my youngest son’s feet. It was horrible. I was tired, He was tired, my husband was tired, and all I wanted to do was sleep, but the nurse had to check His blood sugar.

Why? Well because I had gestational diabetes all during the pregnancy leading up to the birth of my second son. My Dad had triple bypass surgery about three years ago, His mom had type 2 diabetes and later developed Alzheimer’s, and my aunt has type two diabetes as well. The gene pool clearly wasn’t flowing in my favor and the sickness seemed to trickle right down to me. The symptoms were low mood and a lack of energy, but I was mom. So, I chalked it up to job description. I mean, all moms are exhausted right? Apparently, these were warning signs of what was to come, I just didn’t know that at the time.

I ate sugar free chocolate pudding every day after dinner to curb my sweet tooth in a healthy way and took walks when my sugar was especially elevated. After I had my son, and after the heartache of hearing Him cry when the nurse checked His blood sugar, I moved on with life, sweets, and all. But a couple years ago I was diagnosed with chronic gastritis and acid reflux. So, this is when I became a vegan. I let go of the meats and cheeses, filled up the fridge with vegetables, and watched many documentaries about how diet is connected to overall health. My favorite documentary is still “What the Health” by Kip Anderson. In this documentary, Kip uncovers the secret to reversing chronic diseases.

After years of living a vegan lifestyle and seeing the health benefits including clear skin, good digestion, and overall increase in energy, I began to get lax in my efforts and became a vegetarian, and now I eat meat again. The point is that those habits are only as effective as my ability to maintain these healthy eating choices consistently and over a long period of time. Now I am focusing on eating healthy foods overall. I’m pulling back out those old but loved vegan recipes including crispy tofu with quinoa and steak seasoned zucchini. I even put some of the candy from my Christmas bag into the communal candy pile for someone else to devour. This may sound small to you, but it’s a big deal for me.

I said no to Super Bowl brownies and key lime cake last night, as well as all the diet sodas that I used to love. My favorite soda used to be cherry coke zero. The point is that Americans, myself included, consume too much sugar. I know I did, and I now must come up with a game plan to leave the sugar where it needs to stay, on the shelf for special occasions. According to the American Heart Association Americans on average consume 20 teaspoons of sugar per day while the recommended daily amount of sugar is 6 teaspoons for women and 9 teaspoons for men. Beverages make up most of our sugar consumption at a whopping 47% which include soft drinks, sports drinks, energy drinks, coffee, and tea. The second leading cause of excess sugar comes from snacks and sweets at 31%.

The point is, sugar consumption has gotten way out of control, especially in the United States, and we need to be aware of the risks associated with excess sugar which include chronic inflammation, tooth decay, acne, advanced skin aging, weight gain and obesity, diabetes and insulin resistance, cardiovascular disease, high blood pressure, brain loss, cancer, and premature death. Sugar though sweet can be deadly. It’s recommended by John Hopkins Medicine that we avoid sodas and other sugar sweetened beverages, reach for fruits instead of candy, cookies, or other sweet treats, read ingredient labels, and watch for sugar aliases. As it turns out, smoothies with no added sugar still taste sweet because that’s how they are made naturally. If we stop and think before we run to the sweets isle, in the future we will be happy with the choices we make.

            “Always begin with the end in mind.” - Ellen Muth

References:

“How much sugar is too much?” American Heart Association. https://www.heart.org/en/healthy-living/healthy-eating/eat-smart/sugar/how-much-sugar-is-too-much

Ndumele, Chiadi. “Obesity, Sugar, and Heart Health.” Johns Hopkins Medicine. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/wellness-and-prevention/obesity-sugar-and-heart-health

[northgazaupdates]

6-year-old Joan Al-Habil is has been repeatedly hospitalized due to severe gastrointestinal problems and overwhelming fatigue. This poor girl has been to multiple facilities and seen multiple doctors, undergone extensive testing (as extensive as is possible in Gaza's collapsed medical system), even having to endure an unsedated endoscopy.

She has now been diagnosed with severe gastritis due to starvation and hazardous living conditions. Remember, she and her family are living on the streets, which are cold and wet due to winter rain. Homelessness, stress, exposure to the elements, her previous injury when the lOF firebombed her tent, and malnutrition all conspire to sap little Joan of her strength.

Her condition is so serious that she even had to undergo surgery. Gastritis very rarely requires surgery to treat, so this is an indication of how dire her condition is. The surgery was successful to a degree, but she is going to need ongoing treatment to manage her symptoms.

The treatments are administered weekly and cost $500 USD (just under €500 EUR). Her family has no income and cannot afford this. If Joan goes more than a few days without treatment, her symptoms worsen rapidly, and she sometimes has to be hospitalized. It is vital that we help her family procure her treatments so that her condition does not worsen!

You can help Joan get her surgery and treatment by

reblogging this post

copy-pasting this link (https:// gofund.me/85a1b400) in your own Tumblr posts and all across your social media accounts to share her family’s story

boosting posts from her parents @mahafamily1 and @ahmed-family-1

donating to her family’s GFM campaign below

Current: €22,271 EUR

New temporary goal: €22,771 EUR

Need to raise: about €500 EUR ($500 USD)

[cannabiscomrade]

hi there, i want to thank you for talking about gastroparesis and sharing your experiences with tube feeding. i may or may not have gastroparesis as well, my gastric emptying test was inconclusive, but my stomach issues are pretty disabling and i have wondered if tube feeding might someday be necessary for me. hearing about your experience makes it a lot less scary sounding! i wonder if you would be comfortable sharing a little more about how tube feeding has improved your health, and impacted your daily life (for better or worse)? are there things you can do now that you couldn’t have done before tube feeding, or vice versa? feel free to take your time answering, or not answer at all if it’s too personal. either way, i appreciate you!

I'd love to talk more about it!

I can empathize with your GES results. They can just end up being just a snapshot of your entire experience, and unfortunately they can just catch you on a "good" day where your emptying times are better. I know some people will intentionally trigger flares to get more accurate numbers on their study.

I'll preface with a little more information about me. I was misdiagnosed for 16 years with Cyclic Vomiting Syndrome and dealt with that and other vague GI diagnoses like GERD and IBS-D episodically and it gradually got worse over time. I was never given a GES until 2022. After I got pregnant and gave birth in 2020 I drifted into this pattern of daily morning vomiting, then I went into a flare last August that I never left. I was diagnosed with gastroparesis in Nov 2022, caught covid for the first time at the end of Nov, and got my tube Jan 2023.

Tube feeding has significantly improved by health. I was slowly dying from starvation ketoacidosis in December 2022. But even when I was eating orally I struggled with severe gastric malabsorption for years and often felt symptoms of malnutrition and saw minor malnutrition on labs and never understood why because I was eating, but because of fatphobia I was never given a GES and I was never taken seriously until I lost a significant amount of weight. In the most severe moments I was having constant diarrhea and vomiting and I've had so many hospitalizations due to dehydration and vomiting alone when I was eating orally.

I'm about 7 months in and I'm getting about 1300-1500ish calories a day, which is not my goal and it needs to be increased. But the difference with it being in my jejunum is that I'm absorbing 100% of those calories and it has helped my energy and my immune system so much. I've been able to significantly slow the weight loss while we investigate the root cause of my gastroparesis, as well as test for intestinal dysmotility. My hair is growing back, my nails are stronger, and I'm having general improvement of my IBS-D.

That being said, being on feeds and fluids, especially continuous feeds, it does impact my lifestyle a lot. I need accommodations at work. I can't let my feeds get over room temp or fluctuate temp too much. When my bags are full and it's in my backpack I'm carrying 2L of liquid and a pump, plus an additional medical bag with supplies. I even have to sleep at an angle to prevent aspiration. And the fun of stoma care. Cats also seem to have a taste for formula and tubing, which has banished my fur children from our bedroom at night. My medical supplies take up half of my dining room. It's certainly a major life change.

But without all of that, I would be dead. For a lot of us, being without alternate nutrition means either death or severe suffering from symptoms of gastroparesis. This is my symptom tracker for vomiting over the past year. You can see the stark difference between July-December and January-now.

This alone was enough for me to justify for myself that a medical device was necessary. Even without the starvation, I still have two hernias from vomiting and developed chronic gastritis secondary to the GP.

The one thing with tube feeding is that your digestive system is like a muscle. If you don't use it, you lose it. And I've definitely noticed a decline in my capacity to tolerate anything in my stomach for long, even liquids. I'm grieving this and learning how to live with this because there isn't an alternative for me at this moment. I'm still trying, I use the gastric port to drain a lot just to keep what little of my stomach's function it still has.

[healixhospitals24]

When to See a Surgical Gastroenterologist: Signs and Symptoms to Watch For

Your digestive health is crucial to your overall well-being, and understanding when to visit a gastroenterologist - particularly a surgical gastroenterologist - can make a significant difference in addressing gastrointestinal (GI) problems before they become severe. Surgical gastroenterology involves both the diagnosis and surgical treatment of various digestive health problems. This specialized field of medicine deals with conditions that often require surgical intervention for relief and proper management.

In this blog, we will explore the signs and symptoms that indicate when you need to see a surgical gastroenterologist. Knowing these warning signs can help you seek timely medical attention and avoid complications that may require more extensive gastrointestinal surgery.

At Healix Hospitals, we understand the importance of addressing gastrointestinal issues requiring surgery early on, and our team of experienced surgeons is ready to guide you through every step of the process.

When to Visit a Gastroenterologist: Key Symptoms to Look For

The decision of when to visit a gastroenterologist can often be tricky, especially when dealing with digestive health problems that can range from mild discomfort to severe conditions. However, some symptoms are clear indicators that professional help is needed. Let's explore these signs and how a surgical gastroenterologist can provide the necessary care.

1. Chronic Abdominal Pain: A Red Flag for Surgical Intervention

Chronic abdominal pain is one of the most common reasons people seek medical attention for digestive issues. This type of pain, which lasts for weeks or months, should never be ignored, as it may be a sign of a serious underlying condition.

When to visit a gastroenterologist for chronic abdominal pain:

Severe and persistent pain that does not improve with over-the-counter medication or lifestyle changes.

Pain associated with eating or specific foods, suggests a possible gastrointestinal disorder.

Pain that becomes worse over time or is combined with other concerning symptoms, such as weight loss or fever.

A surgical gastroenterologist can assess the cause of chronic abdominal pain through advanced imaging techniques and diagnostic tests, such as endoscopy or CT scans, and determine whether gastrointestinal surgery is required to address the issue.

2. Indigestion and Bloating Causes: More Than Just Discomfort

Many people experience indigestion or bloating from time to time, but when these symptoms become frequent or severe, they could signal a more serious digestive disorder that requires surgical intervention.

Signs that indigestion and bloating may indicate a need for a surgical gastroenterologist:

Persistent bloating that doesn’t go away with dietary changes or medications.

Severe indigestion after eating, especially if it is accompanied by nausea, vomiting, or a feeling of fullness even after small meals.

Gastrointestinal issues requiring surgery, such as gallstones or peptic ulcers, may be the cause of these symptoms.

A surgical gastroenterologist can diagnose the root cause of persistent indigestion and bloating, such as gastritis, acid reflux, or gallbladder disease, and recommend appropriate gastrointestinal surgery if necessary.

Continue Reading: https://www.healixhospitals.com/blogs/when-to-see-a-surgical-gastroenterologist:-signs-and-symptoms-to-watch-for