Do I Have a Cold, Flu or What HELP!

[MacMini]

Hello!

I have been with the same sore throat problem again since December of 2005. The sore throat comes and goes, but now the sore throat is causing me to get sick, I have been sick more than 4 times in two months. Right now I have a severe sore throat, my PCP doesn't know what I have, first they said acute bronchitis, then they said allergies but I don't think is that. In the last four months I have been on Cipro 800mg, Avelox, Tylenol 500mg, Azithromycin 250mg dose pagre, Mytussin AC Syrup MOR, ZMax 2g, Sudafed 30mg. As of Today they got me on Acyclovir 800mg, one tablet three times a day again because my PCP said it might be Oral herpes, NOT the STD one. Last time they put me on Acyclovir it didn't do anything, the sore throat just went away by itself.

Right now my sore throat is so bad that I might consider going to the emergency room tommarrow if I continue to have it. My throat feels so raw and I have FLU SYMPTOMS, when I Breath my nose inside feels raw and super dry. What could be causing all this? It never goes away, and everytime It keeps getting worst.


Please Help, anyone that can comment.

[aswander]

A possiblility is acid reflux. There are 2 ares of pressure in the esophagous called the lower and upper esophageal spinchter muscles that normally keep the acid from rising out of our stomach into our esophagous and throat. Sometimes those "muscles" get flaccid (usually from prescription medications) and permanently weaken, allowing acid to escape into the esophagous (heartburn) or further up into the throat (sore throats, chronic cough, lump-feeling in throat, difficulty swallowing, sinusitis-like symtpoms).

The acid in our stomachs is called HCL, hydro-chloric acid and it is a very very strong acid. When it gets into our throat, it gets smeared around via the mucous, and causes erosions and damage througout the nasal passages and sinuses, often leading to a mis-diagnosis of sinusitis.

If reflux is causing your sore throat, it's easy to fix it. You don't even need to be scoped. Just ask your doctor for a prescription of 2 Nexium per day to treat LPR (laryngo-pharyngeal reflux). If it's reflux, you should begin feeling better in anywhere from 20 minutes to 2 weeks. If it doesn't clear up, it's probably not reflux.

People with LPR typically take 2 PPIs (nexium, aciphex, prilosec, etc.) per day for life. Most doctors are familiar with heartburn, but have never heard of LPR. Therefore, if you are having throat symptoms caused by reflux, you must educate your doctor occasionally and demand the prescription for 2 PPIs a day, not the 1 PPi that is used to treat heartburn. A PPI is a category of drug called a proton-pump inhibitor that reduces the amount of acid produced by your stomach, thereby making less acid escape into your throat.

If the 2 PPIs work for you, you can experiment with lowering the dose AFTER you are healed, not before. Also, Nexium is the PPI that works best, hands down, for people with LPR.

There is a lot of discussion about LPR and laryngeal reflux on the GERD board.

Also, if you need to educate your doctor and have the time to hit the library, there was a really good article published by the Official Journal of the American Academy of Physician Assistants in 2002 titled "Laryngopharyngeal reflux—It’s not GERD". Very helpful, and it includes the proper PPI treatment - 2 times per day.

Hope that might help.