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OGDS, anyone?

By Ern Sheong | January 8, 2010

For a couple of years now, even before I left for the States to study, I have been having this condition where there is a lot of wind in my stomach, and thus a lot of burping.. I came home recently and this condition did not recede, so my mum insisted that I go see the doc, despite my resistance to that idea. As a result, I went to see the GP, but he did not help very much, and thus I went to see a Dr Suresh, a gastroenterologist at Assunta Hospital in PJ. He told me that in order to see what the problem was, I had to be sedated and have a stomach endoscopy done.

So this morning I went, 7 am in the morning.. But the nurse also told me that I could have the choice to have the endoscopy done without needing to be sedated. They would spray what I presume to be local anesthetic. I was afraid of sedation, of being unconscious, so I opted for this (without my mum’s approval, since she was outside. but hey, I’m 21!). So in the operating theatre after spraying something that felt very hot in my throat all the way down, they put a metal ring in my mouth, and made me swallow this < 1 cm rubber tubing that was then slowly pushed down through my oesophagus and into my stomach. Dang I was SO SCARED WEI until I cried, somehow my left eye was tearing a bit. Well, just a bit :) I am fully awake and they shaft this thing down my throat. But the doctor kept of speaking words of reassurance, saying “I’ll be over in a few minutes”, “Not painful wan ah”, “Nothing to be afraid of”, and so okay lor. If they did not tell me to breathe through my nose I would have not known how to breathe in my panic!

Almost immediately I was diagnosed as H.pylori (Helicobacter pylori) positive (this is for my docs-to-be friends out there to read up :) ). The doc said no stomach ulcer, no stomach cancer (phew!). I was actually prepared to die today, to be frank. Something could have gone really wrong. But thank God I live to type this. Apparently this bacteria infects during childhood but causes not much problems until later in life. If left untreated, it could even cause stomach cancer later in life, hmm. Not to mention stomach ulcers. As of now, it is causing the problem of gastritis. Antibiotics were prescribed, so there is nothing much to worry about :)

Assunta also gave me a dvd recording of the whole journey through my oesophagus and stomach. Pretty fun watching, seeing how those clippers pulled at my stomach walls to get a sample tissue. In the dvd I saw the stomach wall bleed as these samples were taken, but I felt no pain. Bill came to a whopping RM 1300, yikes, no medical insurance in Malaysia. JPA’s one only covers the US. And of course, only two things can make me see a doc in the US: 1) A screaming/pleading mum, and 2) something worthy of intensive care. I prefer nature’s healing. Well here back home point 1 made me see the doc.

So I was advised not to take sour or spicy food, because the bacteria loves acidic environments. How to be Malaysian liddat? NO spicy??

Go docs-to-be, study hard!

P.S. OGDS stands for Oesophagusgastroduodenoscopy.

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