Ask Your
Doctor About Evaluation. Many people suffer with symptoms of heartburn,
swallowing, coughing & breathing difficulties and food getting stuck in the
throat without getting a full understanding of what the problem is or know how to fix it.
Unfortunately,
people may go from one evaluation to another, often over many years, with no
effective symptom resolution or answers about what the problem is.
Sometimes
patients just give up reporting the symptoms or may be treated with
less-than-optimal results and figure they just "have to live with it. This fragmented care increases costs and risks
increased patient illness, including risks of more serious problems in the
throat and esophagus.
Working with referring physicians, these
problems can be addressed in a comprehensive assessment.
Without
a complete evaluation, these symptoms can be a difficult to manage:
- Approximately 3.1 million people are hospitalized
annually in the United States for GERD/Reflux-related symptoms,
complications, and treatment.
- There are approximately 64.6 million prescriptions
written for GERD medications in the United States annually.
- Approximately 5% of all patient consults that a primary
care physician completes are related to GERD.
- People with GERD have a lower reported health-related
qualify of life, which includes reduced enjoyment of food (80%), sleep
problems (60%), and work concentration difficulties when symptoms were
present (40 %).
- It is estimated by the American College of
Gastroenterology that the symptoms of GERD result in almost $2 billion in
lost productivity each week of the year.