Barrett's Esophagus
There are many strange diseases in this world and not many of them are well known considering only a few people in the world have that type of condition. Barrett's esophagus just happens to be one of those diseases. This article will explore what Barret's esophagus is, what are the many effects that it has on the body, and what kinds of curing treatments are available for this disease.
So you might ask, " What in the world is Barrett's esophagus?" Well I will tell you. Barrett's esophagus is a condition in which the esophagus is mutated and its lining becomes like the type of tissue generally found in the intestines due to intestinal metaplasia. So you can see why I said rare and strange disease. Though Barrett's esophagus is not symptomatic usually in itself people with this rare disease are susceptible to a rare and extremely hazardous type of cancer called, esophageal adenocarcinoma. That leads this discussion into our next topic of what barrett's esophagus can do to your body.
As I mentioned earlier Barrett's esophagus can cause a rare and severely deadly cancer called esophageal adenocarcinoma. Barrett's esophagus is also commonly associated with people who have GERD or acid reflux disease. Over six hundred ninety nine thousand people in the United States are estimated to have Barrett's esophagus. The cause for Barrett's Esophagus is not identified yet it is commonly associated with the same factors as acid reflux disease. Acid reflux symptoms include severe heartburn and stomach aches. Strangely enough though Barrett's Esophagus is usually occurring on white males at ages of sixty and above though knowing when the problem actually started is hard to tell. Not to many occurrences of Barrett's Esophagus have been located in children. One other thing that you need to know about esophageal adenocarcinoma is that it is often incurable as it is discovered at a late stage and treatments are not effective.
Though Barrett's esophagus is commonly associated with people who have acid reflux, that can sometimes be treated with a change in nutrition, Barrett's esophagus has no natural cure. The choices for treatment are very slim. You either live with it or have surgery to extract the esophagus completely from your body. this surgical technique has not been proved effective though. Surgery is a choice if you are at high risk of cancer.
Know you know what this rare disease is, what it does to the body, and that there is not treatment if you get it. Hopefully this disease will not effect you.