I have been railing against acid blocking drugs for decades because they interfere with proper digestion of foods. When the ones that do it 100% (PPIs) came out in the 80’s I was in Medical School. We were happy with H2 blockers (Zantac, Tagamet, Pepcid) that block acid only partially. Our professors told us to use PPIs only in the most severe cases of ulcers complicated by bleeding. BUT, to leave a patient on them for years without any effort to change one’s diet or the Microbiome (gut flora) will soon be malpractice. Any doctor who tells you GERD and Ulcers cannot be cured is sadly misinformed.
PPIs are now over the counter and even recommended for heartburn. They have now been linked to more heart attacks, intestinal dysbiosis, osteoporosis, depression, and other minor nuisances, like death. Other than that they are OK. Why can they be so problematic? As stated above they interfere with proper digestion and absorption of nutrients in addition to altering the delicate ecology of gut bacteria.
PPIs may be linked to higher risk of death, research suggests
On its website, CBS News (7/3, Marcus) reported that research published in BMJ Open suggests proton pump inhibitors (PPIs) may be associated “with higher risk of death.” Investigators “looked at data on 275,933 people who had been prescribed a PPI and 73,355 who’d been prescribed an H2 blocker between October 2006 and September 2008, tracking deaths up to five years.” The researchers “found a 25 percent increased risk of death in the patients who took a PPI compared with the people who took H2 blockers – about one extra death for every 500 people taking PPIs for a year.”
