Is it harmful to take antacids every day? Here we want to look at the risks and benefits of taking antacids every day. Mostly we will look at what the potential problems are from taking daily antacids, like nutrient deficiencies and other problems lower down in the digestive tract.
Is it harmful to take antacids every day my name is dr taran allen in this video we’re going to look at some of the risks and benefits of taking antacids every day and more so going to look at what the potential downsides are to taking these from nutrient deficiencies and other problems lower down in the digestive tract that can come from taking antacids every day
So if you like the type of information that i’m providing and want to provide a financial support to the channel then click on the southwest integrative medicine icon that will take you to the main youtube page for southwest integrative medicine and you’ll see in the upper right hand side there’s a paypal link which you can use to make a donation if you do choose
To do that i would really appreciate it thanks for watching let’s dig into it so is it harmful to take antacids every day let’s look at what antacids are and how they can be helpful so antacids are very important in preventing serious damage to the mucosal or cell lining inside the esophagus and inside the stomach they do come at a cost so let’s first look
At what we mean by antacid because there are several different types and mechanisms of reducing the acid production so the simplest versions are things like tums which contain bicarbonate and these basically neutralize the acid that’s coming out of the cells of the stomach there are also things like histamine type 2 blockers so these are things like ranitidine
And fomodidine all of the things that end in dine are similar types of histamine to blockers and the histamine binds to the parietal cells and bridal cells or cells in the digestive tract when the histamine binds to the parietal cells it causes acid to be released from these cells so the histamine type 2 blockers block the production of acid through binding to
That receptor and inhibiting the histamine from binding and it can reduce the production of acid by as much as 50 to 70 percent there are also antacids uh that are called proton pump inhibitors these include things like prilosec and pantoprazole and these directly inhibit the pump that creates the acid and that can inhibit it by as much as 90 so there are three
Main types of antacids there’s the neutralization of the acid there’s the inhibiting of the histamine from binding which then reduces the acid and then there’s directly binding and inhibiting the pump that makes the acid so the idea with taking antacids is that you’re going to reduce the acid and thereby allow the mucous membranes or these cells in the digestive
Tract and the esophagus in the stomach to take a break from all the acid production and this can be helpful for short periods of time but in looking at what the potential harm is or the cost of this we also have to have to ask what is the purpose of the acid uh to begin with why is the body producing the acid mainly the first thing that the the acid does is it
Activates enzymes in the stomach which then go on to do the bulk of the digestion and breakdown of the protein bonds in the stomach so this is the first problem with taking antacids every day there’s less food breakdown in the stomach leading to decreased absorption of nutrients both in the stomach and further down most of the absorption occurs lower down but
Some does occur in the stomach as well but there’s actually a lot more to the story so the same cells that are being inhibited by the proton pump inhibitors and the histamine blockers also produce something called intrinsic factor an intrinsic factor is needed to absorb b12 lower down in the body so what happens with b12 is it’s tangled in with the proteins that
We eat like animal proteins when we consume the protein the acids and enzymes start to break apart those protein bonds and the intrinsic factor can bind to the b12 further down in the small intestine is where it’s actually taken up by the body but when you are inhibiting the parietal cells from producing acid you’re also inhibiting the production of intrinsic
Factor in addition when there is decreased acid in the stomach it changes what happens further down in the small intestine there’s not enough acid secreted in the stomach then it doesn’t trigger the secretin which is a hormone that’s produced in the small intestine in response to the acidic environment and what secretin does is it causes the pancreas to produce
Bicarbonate and other pancreatic enzymes the bicarbonate neutralizes the stomach acid so that the enzymes that are then produced also by the pancreas can act in that environment because it’s a different ph than what’s higher up in the stomach so when that when the secretin isn’t produced that can change how the enzymes work also when there’s not enough breakdown
Of the proteins there may not be a strong enough activity to produce the cck and cck is another hormone that stimulates the pancreas to produce lipases and proteases and the idea here is that the fat content of the stomach that’s emptying into the small intestine triggers the cck to be produced but if there’s not enough breakdown you’re just getting like a dumping
Of the stomach contents there may not be enough surface area to trigger this cck and then trigger the lipasen and proteases to be produced so then you have further lack of breakdown of your food the other thing is cck also causes the gallbladder to contract and trigger that which is needed for emulsification of the fats that are in the small intestine and then
Lipase can work on the fats so is it harmful to take antacids every day yes it can be but the dose and duration of taking them does matter short term uses like days to weeks your body can recover from this just fine and it may be needed to get your problem under control if there’s severe erosion and other problems going on you may need to even take it for longer
Long-term chronic use definitely will lead to b12 deficiency iron deficiency magnesium and it can also increase your risk for bacterial overgrowth and other microbial imbalances lower down in the small intestine and potential even in the colon so keep this in mind if you’re taking antacids or considering taking them or if you’re already on them you know you may
Want to look at one of my options for getting off them so that you can prevent these and if you are taking them and need to take them make sure you’re checking to see if you have deficiencies of b12 iron and magnesium there may be other vitamin deficiencies too that can occur from taking these antacids so hopefully you know now what the risks and benefits are
Of taking antacids every day it can be harmful and can cause some nutrient deficiencies and other problems so keep that in mind if you like this video please click on the like button and subscribe to the channel if you have questions or comments about any of the contents of this drop it in the comment section i may do a separate video on that if i think there’s
Enough interest thanks again for watching we’ll see you next time
Transcribed from video
Is It Harmful to Take Antacids Every Day? By Southwest Integrative Medicine