Acid Reflux And This Deadly Lung Disease

It isn’t difficult to understand why acid reflux causes problems in the esophagus and throat since the acid directly affects those areas.

The lungs, however—that’s another story.

A new study in the European Respiratory Journal reveals a shocking connection between acid reflux and a serious lung disease that may only leave you three years to live.

Acid reflux has been associated with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) in previous studies. This is a chronic and gradually worsening lung disease characterized by the formation of scar tissue (fibrosis) in the lungs. Scarring prevents the lungs from expanding and contracting properly, which compromises breathing.

Previous studies haven’t shown, however, whether acid reflux causes IPF, IPF causes acid reflux, or if other factors, such as smoking, contribute to both conditions.

To determine whether there is a causal relationship between acid reflux and IPF and, if so, which way the causal relationship runs, the authors of the new study employed a method called bidirectional Mendelian randomization using genetic data.

What exactly did they do?

They considered genetic variants that are strongly linked with acid reflux. These are inherited from parents, not influenced by environmental factors.

They then checked a large population to see whether IPF later developed in people with these genetic vulnerabilities to acid reflux.

They then turned the study around and identified the IPF genes before checking whether acid reflux developed later in people with those genes.

This approach allowed them to tell which was the cause and which was the effect, or which was present first and which followed later.

This study used the largest available genome-wide association meta-analyses on acid reflux (78,707 cases and 288,734 controls) and IPF (4,125 cases and 20,464 controls).

Here is what they found out:

1. Participants with acid reflux were 1.6 times more likely to develop IPF than those without acid reflux.

2. There was no evidence of a causal effect of IPF on the risk of developing acid reflux.

This means that acid reflux is the culprit behind some IPF cases.

IPF is incredibly serious, with a survival rate of only three years. This is another reason to address your acid reflux ASAP!

Fortunately, it’s quite easy to eliminate acid reflux permanently using three ingredients you already have in your kitchen. Follow the example of thousands of readers explained here…