Transcript
As far as testing, the upper endoscopy that we talked about earlier will help the physicians determine if you have any injury because of your reflux disease. That is a separate test, which is more of a gold standard for reflux and that’s called a Ph test with impedance. Impedance just means that you can tell which direction the refluxate is going. The way that Ph test is done, a small catheter is placed through your nose passed down to your esophagus, a fair distance almost to the end of your esophagus. All right, and you walk around with this catheter in place for 24 hours. Now you’ll have a little walkman type device or on your belt, and if you feel heartburn, you press one button. If you take your medications, you press a different button. If you eat a meal, you press a different button. If you recline like you’re going asleep, press a different button and duration of acid reflux will be recorded over 24 hour period of time. There’s a particular score called the DeMeester score and it has to be less than close to 15 to be within a normal range. If your DeMeester score is greater than, let’s say 15 then that’s compatible with acid reflux disease.