Weak stomach should have endoscopy to check?

My mother is 46 years old, recently her intestines are weak, after a full dinner or eating sour soup or fish sauce, her stomach hurts and feels uncomfortable. Should my mother have a gastroscopy? (Hai Ha, Long An)

Reply:

Gastroscopy is a procedure in which a flexible endoscope is inserted through the mouth into the digestive tract to examine and observe the organs of the digestive tract including the esophagus, stomach, duodenum and duodenum. This method is safe and easy to detect and identify lesions of the upper digestive tract.

During endoscopy, the doctor can use a number of instruments to cut polyps, perform biopsies, stop bleeding, remove foreign objects in the digestive tract, dilate narrowed areas, ligate esophageal veins...

Doctors often prescribe a gastroscopy in cases where the patient has symptoms of suspected upper gastrointestinal disease causing difficulty swallowing, epigastric pain, belching, heartburn, loss of appetite, indigestion, bloating, nausea, and black stools.

People who need to take diagnostic tissue samples (biopsies), treat certain conditions through gastroscopy such as esophageal dilatation, polyp removal, foreign body removal, and re-evaluate the results after treatment of esophageal-gastric-duodenal diseases, are also indicated for this method.

Doctor Bich Ngoc (middle) performs a gastroscopy on a patient in September 2023. Photo: Provided by the hospital — Doctor Bich Ngoc (middle) performs a gastroscopy on a patient in September 2023. Photo: *Provided by the hospital*

In addition, gastroscopy is recommended for people at high risk of gastrointestinal diseases. Specifically, people with a family history of gastrointestinal cancer, with signs such as abnormalities (dysphagia, vomiting blood, anemia of unknown cause, palpable tumors in the abdomen...).

In addition to the above-mentioned cases, healthy people with no symptoms can also register for a gastroscopy to screen and detect early digestive system abnormalities.

Depending on the health condition, the doctor will advise on the interval between two different gastric endoscopy. Patients with intestinal metaplasia of the gastric mucosa need a periodic endoscopy once a year. Patients with gastric bleeding may be prescribed interventional endoscopy multiple times a day or checked a few days after the intervention because this is a dangerous complication that needs to be monitored for appropriate treatment.

Your mother is 46 years old and is at the age where an endoscopy is needed to screen for intestinal diseases including cancer. Currently, your mother has a weak intestine, just eating sour soup or drinking coconut water causes discomfort and abdominal pain, which can be due to many causes such as indigestion, gastroesophageal reflux (GERD), pancreatitis, allergies or food intolerance...

To know exactly, your mother should go for a check-up, possibly a gastroscopy and colonoscopy to check her intestinal health.

MD.CKI Dang Le Bich Ngoc
Center for Endoscopy and Gastrointestinal Endoscopic Surgery
Tam Anh General Hospital, Ho Chi Minh City

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