What is indigestion?
Dyspepsia is a disease characterized by indigestion.
Causes of dyspepsia
Among the main factors that cause dyspepsia, there is a lack of special digestive enzymes, which causes a syndrome of insufficient absorption. Often the cause of dyspepsia is significant nutritional errors. In this case, we are talking about alimentary dyspepsia.
Symptoms of this disease can be caused by both the lack of a diet and an unbalanced diet.
Thus, a disorder of the functions of the gastrointestinal tract without organic damage to organs leads to the emergence of the so-called functional, or alimentary, dyspepsia. At the same time, an insufficient amount of digestive enzymes is a consequence of damage to organs related to the gastrointestinal tract. In this case, dyspepsia acts only as a symptom of another disease.
As for children, dyspepsia occurs when the amount or composition of food does not correspond to the capabilities of the children’s gastrointestinal tract. Dyspepsia in infants, whose age is not more than one year old, is manifested due to overfeeding, as well as the untimely introduction of new products into the child’s diet.
There is also the concept of physiological dyspepsia, which occurs in children at birth and in the first weeks of life. This manifestation of the disease is not treated, as it passes after the maturation of the gastrointestinal tract.
Older children may experience dyspepsia at the onset of a period when the body is growing rapidly. So, in adolescence, dyspepsia can also occur due to an imbalance of hormones. This time is called the critical period of development. In this state, the gastrointestinal tract becomes too susceptible to any, even the slightest errors in nutrition.
Unfortunately, teenagers often get dyspepsia because they eat fast food, drink carbonated sugary drinks, and foods that contain easily digestible carbohydrates.
Symptoms of dyspepsia
Symptoms of dyspepsia can manifest themselves in different ways, depending on the specific type of disorder, but there are signs that are simultaneously characteristic of all types of the disease.
Different types of dyspepsia have the following common symptoms:
the appearance of unpleasant sensations in the so-called epigastric region, that is, in the upper abdomen. The patient experiences feelings of fullness and heaviness, sometimes there are pain sensations of varying intensity;
belching. Rare isolated cases of belching are not signs of the disease. Only constant frequent eructation testifies to dyspepsia;
nausea, heartburn. The patient experiences an unpleasant burning sensation in the upper abdomen, as well as in the retrosternal region. This sensation appears at the moment when the aggressive contents of the stomach enter the esophagus. Normally, such phenomena should not happen;
flatulence. A feeling of fullness in the abdomen, as well as increased gas separation, can be caused by increased formation of gases in the intestines;
stool disorder. Patients who suffer from dyspepsia have irregular, as a rule, frequent stools.
Dyspepsia, which is caused by a lack of a digestive enzyme, has the following symptoms: nausea, an unpleasant aftertaste in the mouth, transfusion and rumbling in the abdomen, malaise, weakness. Sometimes patients experience headaches and insomnia. Feces often contain large amounts of food that is poorly digested.
There is also such a thing as fermentative dyspepsia, it is characterized by rumbling in the abdomen, severe flatulence, frequent loose stools, which is accompanied by the release of foamy light feces, which has a characteristic sour smell. Patients often experience pain.
Putrid dyspepsia is in many ways reminiscent of intoxication: the patient feels weakness and general malaise, feels nausea and severe headache. The stool is dark and liquid, has an unpleasant and rather pungent odor, while the stool is quickened.
Fatty dyspepsia, unlike other types of dyspepsia, is not characterized by frequent diarrhea. Patients suffering from fatty dyspepsia experience a feeling of fullness and heaviness in the abdomen, complain of flatulence and belching, as well as severe pain that begins half an hour after eating. Feces are whitish in color and greasy: these are the remains of fat that does not have time to be digested. The stool is plentiful.
Young children also suffer from dyspepsia. In them, it manifests itself in regurgitation and bloating. The chair is frequent, more than six times a day, the feces are green, whitish flakes come across. At the same time, the child is naughty, sleeps and eats poorly.
Dyspepsia treatment
Dyspepsia of alimentary origin is treated by assigning a hungry pause to the patient, which should last up to one and a half days. After that, a balanced diet is gradually introduced into the patient’s diet in compliance with the correct regimen.
Foods that often cause disease should be excluded from the patient’s diet. It is important that the patient drink at least one and a half liters of fluid per day.
Dyspepsia, which is caused by an enzyme deficiency, is treated by correcting the deficiency. For this, substitution therapy is used with drugs that contain the required enzymes in the required amount. The patient must necessarily follow a special diet, which is aimed at unloading the altered part of the gastrointestinal tract. If the patient suffers from this type of dyspepsia, treatment of the underlying disease is necessary.
[Video] Dr. Zaur Orudzhev – What is Dyspepsia? (Indigestion):