The reason I asked was I never had reflux/heartburn whatsoever at all until just one day, everything came all at once. I started off one day with severe post nasal drip, then stomach upset , then now non-stop LPR symptoms for 6 months. I am suspecting a virus or bateria did the trick. Afterall , ulcer was caused by the H pylori which nobody found out until a decade later. I did have the Pylori test on me and it was negative. BUt who knows, there can be so many other virus or germs out there. Has anyone tried taking any stomach antibiotic (cipro...) and fix the reflux? I am willing to try anything now cause the symptoms are unbearable and definitely affecting my life style....

umm i have been on antibiotics and only made the reflux worse

Hi dorisnflau1!

I also wonder if it could be caused by bacteria. I bought that yogurt Activia that is supposed to have billions of bacteria (Bifidus Regularis) to regulate your digestive tract. Before eating this yogurt, I never had problems. Then bam a week and a half of eating the yogurt and I develop symptoms for GERD! I still think it has something to do with the yogurt, and I don't care if that makes me sound ridiculous. I refuse to take PPI's for the rest of my life. They are toxic and they prevent your stomach from digesting correctly. My friend Anne's doctor told her that she will need to take a pill a day for life. I think that that is unacceptable! Sorry for the rant, I am frustrated.

Anyhoo, I wonder if more studies on this disease will reveal that GERD is brought on by something and more importantly that it is curable.

I have not tried a stomach antibiotic. But I read on the digestive disorder board how taking Magnesium pills is helping people with GERD symptoms, to feel better.

people have been on long-term antibiotics and still get heartburn.. I was on antibiotics for 2 weeks one time for pneumonia.. it didn't help it at all. In fact it most cases antibiotics can cause gastric problems. Therefore if it is a bacteria, it's something that current antibiotics aren't able to touch. People get GERD for different reasons.. for some it's possible it's viral or some unknown bacteria maybe.. for others something triggered the LES to not work correctly. If anything I think we're going to find it's something in our diet.. I can't imagine people several hundred years ago had the rate of GERD we do today.

I absolutely agree it is something we ate that trigger the GERD. Like I said I never have any kind of gastro symptoms in my whole life. I have never even tried a bottle of Malox. Then I was out of the country, went out and eat a lot (seafood kind), then that was it. GERD symptoms for 6 months. It was horrible!! Therefore I still think there were some unknown virus or bacterial that caused that. Did anybody try Cipro before? One of my doctor said Cipro is a kind of antibiotic that will not hurt the good bacteria in the stomach. But then I heard other bad story of Cipro that I have not tried. Maybe I subconsciously think Cipro will work and I will safe it for my last resource. How sad....

I've taken it before and Cipro is evil.. gave me tendonitis in my left hip.. i will never take it again. It's a very strong drug that shouldn't be used unless necessary.

I recently began taking probiotics and including them in my diet -- through supplements, regular yogurt and Activia. I had the same response as Eve8 and started getting a slight heartburn. I just figured it was a "Herxheimer Reaction" also known as the healing response -- sometimes symptoms get worse before they get better. I've persisted with the yogurt and the probiotics and not only is the heartburn gone, but I feel healthier every day.

My take on it is that the good bacteria in the yogurt "fight" with the bad bacteria and move them on out. That causes some reflux. But if you stay at it, the good guys will win.

BTW, I would NEVER (unless I was about to die) take an antibiotic again. That stuff will kill you. Better to take the natural pro-biotics so that they do the job on a daily basis and you never get to the point that you need the antibiotics. Just a thought. Good luck to you. :wave:

You know I tried to start taking probiotics via capsule & It caused heartburn for me too. Should I have kept at it? I may try the activa myself

Thanks, Katt

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=pubmed&dopt=Abstract&list_uids=16481828&query_hl=6&itool=pubmed_DocSum

This link takes you to a citation located on pubmed.gov published by a Japanese ENT group researching H.Pylori and LPR.

Their findings were that patients with layngeal reflux symptoms who tested postitive for H.pylori antibodies showed more improvement after receiving PPI therapy than patients with laryngeal reflux symptoms who tested negative for h.pylori antibodies (who had also received PPIs).

I wish I could view the entire article - but I can't. It appears that they are suggesting that those LPR patients who had been previously exposed to h.pylori had better responses to PPI treatment than those without exposure to h.pylori.