Seek medical attention immediately if you have severe pain, if you have vomiting where you cannot hold any food down, or if you feel light-headed or dizzy. Tell your doctor if your stomach discomfort occurs after taking prescription or over-the-counter drugs, especially aspirin or other pain relievers.
Gastritis Can Become a Serious Emergency
Feeling confused or passing out can also indicate blood loss. If there is bright red or maroon blood in the stool, a “tarry” appearance in the stool, or vomiting of blood, this is considered an emergency and may be life-threatening.
Gastritis staging distinguishes atrophic versus non-atrophic gastritis, and links to the most advanced gastritis stages III–IV, the highest risk for cancer progression. No prospective long-term follow-up studies are available to support the prognostic impact of gastritis staging in clinical practice.
Dr Sarmed Sami advises that gastritis can last between a few days to a month or longer. The treatment will depend on the specific cause for each patient. If you're experiencing gastritis, book an appointment to seek expert care. Dr Sarmed Sami advises that gastritis can last between a few days to a month or longer.
Gastritis can sometimes lead to pain, nausea and vomiting. But it often has no symptoms at all. If left untreated, though, some types of gastritis can lead to ulcers (sores in the stomach lining) or even stomach cancer.
In more severe cases, some individuals may experience upper gastrointestinal bleeding due to gastric erosions and ulcerations of the mucosa. In turn, this can lead to hematemesis, or vomiting blood, as well as melena, which are smelly, black stools caused by the digestion of blood in the gastrointestinal tract.
Atrophic gastritis destroys the stomach lining cells that make your digestive juices. This raises your risk for getting stomach cancer. It can also cause low levels of certain vitamins in your blood.
Acid blockers — also called histamine (H-2) blockers — reduce the amount of acid released into your digestive tract, which relieves gastritis pain and encourages healing. Available by prescription or over the counter, acid blockers include famotidine (Pepcid), cimetidine (Tagamet HB) and nizatidine (Axid AR).
Lingering gastritis
If you experience persistent symptoms of gastritis that don't go away despite the absence of NSAIDs, alcohol, stress, and radiation, then you most likely have a serious infection in your stomach or a severely damaged gastric mucosa.
A gastritis diet involves the avoidance of spicy, acidic, fried, fatty, and processed foods, including fast foods, full-fat dairy, tomatoes, and citrus. Alcohol, sugary drinks, and caffeine are also on the "miss" list. Choose bland foods that are non-acidic and low in sugar.
If gastritis has been around for a long time, complications such as bleeding gastric ulcers (ulcer ventriculi) may need to be operated on. This requires hospitalization.
It can come and go in some. In others, it may be constant with waxing and waning intensities — with or without specific triggers (like it may be worse before or after eating). Sometimes, the pain will come and hang around. Other times, it comes and goes with periods of little-to-no discomfort.
If it's not treated, gastritis may get worse and cause a stomach ulcer. If gastritis is not getting better, or it's causing severe symptoms, a GP might refer you to a specialist stomach doctor (gastroenterologist). They might do a test to look inside your stomach, called a gastroscopy.
Chronic gastritis is a long term condition that can lead to pain, nausea, bloating, and other symptoms. Chronic gastritis is one of the most common chronic conditions and can last for years or even a lifetime if left untreated.
Gastritis is a condition that causes inflammation in the stomach lining. Bacterial infections are the most common cause of chronic gastritis. GERD is when a person often and repeatedly has acid reflux or heartburn. GERD is a serious condition that can eventually lead to a person experiencing complications.
Gastritis can be a common occurrence because H. pylori occurs in about 35% of the population of the United States. 1 Gastritis has many treatments, including antibiotics to eradicate the H. pylori infection as well as lifestyle changes.
Acute gastritis goes away after the acute cause of it does. If you have an infection, in most cases your immune system will clear it out shortly, and then the inflammation will go down. If you briefly overdosed on alcohol or pills, your stomach lining will soon repair itself.
The healing period for gastritis depends on the cause. Acute gastritis may require medications, but it usually clears within a few days . If a person does not treat gastritis, it may develop into chronic gastritis, which may take months or years to go away.
Water has a neutral ph. Drinking large amounts of water controls the acid levels of gastric juices, which helps accelerate the healing of gastritis. You should avoid drinking too much water immediately before and after meals, as it can be counterproductive.
Gastritis is inflammation (irritation) of the stomach lining. This may be caused by many factors including infection, alcohol, particular medications and some allergic and immune conditions. Gastritis can be either acute (with severe attacks lasting a day or two) or chronic (with long-term appetite loss or nausea).
Dietary tips
The following dietary changes may help prevent or manage gastritis: Eat little but frequently: Eating five or six smaller meals throughout the day — rather than three large meals — can help reduce the production of stomach acid.
You may need to stop taking aspirin, ibuprofen, naproxen, or other medicines that may be causing gastritis. Always talk to your health care provider before stopping any medicine. You may use other over-the-counter and prescription drugs that decrease the amount of acid in the stomach, such as: Antacids.