Gastritis - Constant severe stomach pain

Back again:-)

If you Google "Ask the Diet Doctor: The Truth About Aloe Vera Juice"

It has pros and cons about it. Including a scare store about trials on animals with unfiltered gel.

The filtered juice used by humans had a better write up.

"But it's not all bad news for aloe vera juice. In a 2004 study from the U.K., researchers gave people with active ulcerative colitis, a type of inflammatory bowel disease, aloe vera gel to drink (remember that in the animal study, they used aloe vera juice, not gel). After four weeks of drinking aloe vera gel in water twice per day, there was a clinical response towards improvement and remission of ulcerative colitis, compared to those given plain water. No significant negative side effects were experienced due to drinking the aloe vera gel.

As you can see, the aloe vera story is not as clear cut as many drink labels want you to believe. My personal recommendation is that you should wait for more human research to show that aloe vera provides significant health benefits without negative side effects. If you do choose to drink aloe vera at this time, check with your doctor first, and then make sure that whatever product you use does not contain Aloin"

Anyway my wife has been taking it for about 19 years and is still here to tell the tale.

Hi Derek,

Thank you very much for your above comments, extremely interesting and definitely worth me speaking to my consultant about!

Out of interest does your wife have any symptoms of her stomach swelling etc anymore? or has the Aloe Vera cured her? if you know what I mean

She had lots of symptoms and pain but never noticeable swelling.

Like others she was left in the lurch by consultants at two hospitals.

Last time she had an endoscopy and a CT scan. There was silence after the CT scan. When she inquired to the consultants secretary she was told that it had been clear. He doctor had been sent the result and said the consultant did not need/plan to see her again.

Very interesting! sounds like im going through what she did!

So infuriating that when comes back clear they leave you as they don't class it as life threatening then!

Well I will see how I get on when I see the consultant / CT Scan (if he still agrees I need this) if that's all clear and there is another silence I will definitely try the aloe vera!

Thanks again, will keep you posted.

From Pulse the GP's journal commenting on an apple a day and ginger biscuits!

For years because of not being good at getting up in the morning my breakfast consisted of two ginger biscuits and a cup of tea. I ate several apples a day as our house at that time had been built on the site of an orchard.

"If only that was true. If the simple ‘Granny Smith’ prevented the swathe of minor ailments that came in each day, I’m sure a GP’s workload would be far better. But did you know that eating an apple daily could stave off the discomfort of acid reflux? And so it would seem can many items found in your local supermarket.

Recently, I’ve had two incidences of positive feedback (yes - it’s amazing!) regarding treatment advice I gave for nausea. In both cases, I had advised eating a humble ginger biscuit and in both cases the feedback was it worked surprisingly well. One patient was shocked that a young-ish doctor like myself would suggest ginger over a prescribed anti-emetic. From personal experience of being on a boat pre- scuba diving, ginger was a great cure for my sea-sickness.

Following on from those episodes, a colleague emailed everyone asking if there were any non-pharmalogical cures for reflux. Homeopathy was mentioned but I suspect a millionth dilution of ‘eye of newt’ or such like is unlikely to cure acid reflux. And that’s where using Dr Google brought up a plethora of websites toting natural remedies for reflux - some of which I had previously heard of such as chewing gum and some that seemed counter-intuitive, but seemed to work, like necking a teaspoon of mustard.

GPs tend to prescribe a lot of medications for common ailments, based on patient demand and the evidence base, but often the horrible side effects can put people off taking the drugs, further leading to re-attendance. I recently found out that a drug I used to prescribe regularly as a hospital doctor, has a less than flattering nickname in some circles because it can make some patients quite paranoid and anxious - not a side effect you want to get just for treating sickness!

Whilst I’m not advocating natural remedies for all ailments, many doctors are probably already suggesting treatments because of previous knowledge or experience, for example sage for menopausal hot flushes, peppermint tea for bowel cramps (peppermint oil is a prescribable drug anyway!), camomile tea for relaxation to name a few. Since the time of Hippocrates, the bark extract of the willow has long been used in medicine for treating inflammation and fever and now is prescribed regularly for secondary prevention in cardiac disease. Any ideas what it is?

If suggesting natural remedies with little or no side effects can improve a patients’ well-being, save the NHS a few pennies and increase my positive feedback rate, I reckon that’s no bad thing!"

Hi Jenny

Had ct scan back. All clear but they are saying probably pancreatitis as had that 13 years ago for a year. No ssymptoms of this at all though. I have got cysts on one kidney but they mean nothing. Now they are looking to see if maybe some kind of bowel issue slthough i have no symotoms there at all! Basically no idea still

Hello people,

Thanks Jenny for sharing your story here. I am Aman Chopra from India and i have very similar symptoms as you have. I have this stomach ache since Sep 2013. All test including CT Scan, Endoscopy, Colonoscopy are done but all reports suggest i am fine.

Doctors have diagnosed it with IBS and i am not sure it's helping me either. I am going to try Aloe Vera Supplements as suggested above or Acidophilus tablets to check if it works for me. Keep sharing!

Thanks

Hi, Jenny, my husband has had the same symptoms for over a year. We went to Domnican Republic and many of our group were ill with sickness diarroheah. My husband wasn't ill at the time but got ill when we got home. He was diagnosed with h pylori and took two courses of the three treatments (2 antibiotics and one gastro medicine). He didn't get any better and now having had two endoscopies, a colonoscopy, a CT scan, including putting dye into his body, two ultrasound scans, numerous blood tests, stool samples etc everything is coming back clear. He too was given laxatives despite not being constipated. He was told by one doctor that it was probably (!) IBS but he has none of the usual IBS symptoms. At the last appointment he was given a further blood test to look for coealic disease. We are due back to see consultant on 24 April. I (we) are almost positive it is not coealiac as he is not sick, does not have diarrohea. His symptoms are constant nausea coupled with stomach pain and the feeling of being stabbed between shoulder blades.

Hi Jenny. 

I haven't seen a post from you in the last couple of months, I hope your pain got better!!

I found your story interesting as I have a similar problem in the past 6 YEARS....

It all started in 2008 when I was diagnosed with pancreatitis.

After a couple of days of hospitalisation and diet I was free to go home however I had to go back for blood tests to check if my pancreas is all good.

The blood test came back, pancreas is good but my thrombocyts (red blood cells) are waaaay to low (Normally you'd have 250 000, I had 30 000) which is causing bleeding. Everywhere. Anytime. Internal as well. So I was hospitalised again, for weeks. 

I had a blood condition which I was prescribed STEROIDS for.. (Medrol).

Started with 8mg a day, finished with 120 mg/a day till the day of my splenectomy, (there were a few months between starting medication and surgery, because my blood was too runny, they couldn't cut me, so I had to increase the dose all the time to be able to have a surgery) because they had to remove my spleen in order to stop me from the blood conditon. I was 18 back then. I've put on 30 kg in 1 year, and the steroids have done so much damage to my body, you can't imagine both inside an out...

In the hospital all they said to me was: "Be careful with the steroids, the can cause you stomach pain"... Well, appareantly I wasn't careful enough because I've been living with this unexplainable pain in the past 6 YEARS!!!!!

I was told that your body needs about 5 years to get rid of the traces of steroids which was last year and nothing happened.... 

I was taking probiotics and different tablets for stomach care but nothing worked.

I've been trying to find out what causes the pain for 5-6 years now, with no success....

I wake up early in the morning (around 4-5am) for the pain, and am awake until it settles. Usually it gets better if I eat or drink something, otherwise it makes my life miserable, I can become very grumpy. It happens during the day as well, so basically when my stomach starts to feel empty (every 3-4 hours) it gives me the "sign"....

So I usually associate the pain with hunger.... If i eat, it gets better, if not, it just gets worse

I've done all sorts of tests, tried gastroscopy, tablets, vitamins and nothing seemed to ease my pain.

When I had my tests done, the doctor came to me saying that the good news is that everything is fine, and the bad news is that everything is fine... So it's very good that there are no visible symptoms of some serious condition, but it doesn't help me and I can't have a good quality of life at the age of 24.

I always have to make sure I've got some snacks in my bag otherwise I panic and become agitated again. 

Obviously I have weight problems since then, ( I was about 65 kg when the problem started, and I'm almost a 100 kg now... very sad and scary).

I can't really lose weight, but I can gain kilos very quickly and easily.. 

It's hard to explain to my mind for example that I'm not hungry and I do not need those carbs, but my body tells me otherwise and in order to keep my body happy and to be able to work, I have to give my body what it "needs" otherwise i can't function...

I've tried to settle my stomach pain with fruits, nuts, good fats and healthy stuff but I've got a feeling that I'm now addicted to carbohydrates and if I don't have it, the pain will kill me.........it's a vicious circle, because I need to stop eating so much carbs for the pain the go away, but if I don't have it I feel hungry ALL THE TIME.

Anyway, this is my little story about stomach pains, I feel what you feel, and I really hope that your pain will go away very soon because it's not something you can live with forever...