Publisher Description

Do you suffer from abdominal bloating; a chronic, nagging cough or sore throat; post-nasal drip; a feeling of a lump in the back of your throat; allergies; or a shortness of breath? If so, odds are that you are experiencing acid reflux without recognizing the silent symptoms. Even without the presence of heartburn or indigestion, more than 60 million people are suffering from acid-related disorders that are undetected or untreated--and leading to long-term health problems, including the rapid rise of esophageal cancer. Since there are no outward signs of acid damage and the typical symptoms might not be recognized, until now you might not have known how pervasive acid reflux is or that you have it. aaaa In The Acid Watcher Diet, Dr. Jonathan Aviv, one of the leading authorities on the diagnosis and treatment of acid reflux disease, helps readers identify those silent symptoms and provides his proven solution for reducing whole-body acid damage quickly and easily. His 28-day program includes a two-phase eating plan, menu guide, and recipes and works to immediately neutralize acid, stabilize pH levels, and relieve the inflammation at the root of acid reflux. Dr. Aviv's Power of Five rule will help readers discover the key foods that offer fast relief, and his Daily Six will reveal the foods to avoid (onion, tomato, citrus, and more). aaaa The Acid Watcher Diet's groundbreaking program is just what millions of readers need to reduce acid and balance their bodies and minds for optimal health.

Author Biography

Leyda, a veteran of three years in Soviet film schools and studios and a student of Eisenstein, is Gottesman Professor of Cinema Studies at New York University.

Review

"The Acid Watcher Diet both explains how the varied symptoms of acid reflux arise, and details a program for healing and prevention that can help many, if not most, people avoid the medications commonly prescribed to treat it." --Jane Brody, The New York Times "Dr. Aviv's Acid Watcher Diet is a blueprint for using "food as medicine" to not only heal and prevent acid reflux disease but to prevent and heal inflammation throughout the body." --Steve Kroft, CBS news, 60 minutes

"The Acid Watcher Diet is a great, fast read that functions as both an indispensable voice care roadmap as well as a guide to an empowering lifestyle for acid reflux sufferers, featuring a simple healing diet that benefits not only recording artists, but everyone's overall health and well-being." --Craig Kallman, Chairman and CEO of Atlantic Records

"An illuminating book. The Acid Watcher diet is an easy-to-follow, easy-to-prepare healing diet that is vital not only to treating your acid reflux disease but also to maintaining your overall health." --John Turturro, actor-director

Review Quote

"The Acid Watcher Diet is a great, fast read that functions as both an indispensable voice care roadmap as well as a guide to an empowering lifestyle for acid reflux sufferers, featuring a simple healing diet that benefits not only recording artists, but everyone's overall health and well-being." - Craig Kallman, Chairman and CEO of Atlantic Records "Dr. Aviv's Acid Watcher Diet

Excerpt from Book

Chapter 1 Dietary Acid Damage Why We Should All Fear It Dietary acid damage is one of the foremost health challenges Americans face, affecting more people than heart disease, diabetes, and celiac disease. Recent statistics reveal that incidence of gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD), the most common form of acid damage, has more than doubled since 1995; in the United States alone at least sixty million people have acid reflux (the common name for GERD), and worldwide that number leaps to 1.4 billion people. Some researchers have even gone so far as to declare that a global GERD epidemic is taking place. Since there are no external signs of acid damage, you may not know how pervasive it is. But experts in gastroenterology and otolaryngology (ear, nose, and throat [ENT]) see it in their patients every day. Even more alarming than the increase in the frequency of the occurrence is the severity of the symptoms. Over the last year, in my practice alone, I have diagnosed Barrett''s esophagus, a potentially precancerous condition of the esophageal lining, in nine patients under age thirty. That''s a big number for a disease that was once considered rare in people under age fifty, and a startling revelation of how young people with the disease have become. All of these patients had only throat-based symptoms and no heartburn complaints (more on this shortly). Ten years ago this would have been a reportable finding, but not anymore. Acid Damage 2.0: It''s Not Just Heartburn Anymore What is acid damage? It''s a broad range of conditions that contribute to inflammation and disease in various parts of the body. You''ve likely heard of acid damage in the context of GERD, a condition that a doctor will typically diagnose you with only if you''re experiencing the symptoms of heartburn and regurgitation. Surprisingly, though so many people experience the symptoms, they don''t always know what causes them. Many of my patients ask: What are heartburn and regurgitation exactly, and how will I feel if I have them? The simple answer is that heartburn occurs when gastric acid from the stomach goes the wrong way, or refluxes, up into the delicate tissues of the esophagus, causing a burning sensation at the bottom of the chest and rib cage that can emanate out through the middle of the chest and toward the throat. Regurgitation is the sensation of food coming back up into your chest and throat after you''ve already swallowed it. These symptoms are the poster children of acid reflux, but they aren''t the only symptoms related to acid damage--in fact, they''re not even the most common. In my practice, where we see up to seventy thousand people a month in more than forty different offices, over 90 percent of the people diagnosed with acid reflux disease do not have these typical symptoms. They are more likely to have throat-related complaints such as feeling a lumplike sensation in the throat severe enough to cause dysphagia, or difficulty swallowing. Other common symptoms are chronic cough (which, diagnostically speaking, is cough that persists longer than eight weeks), hoarseness, frequent throat clearing, and sore throat. If you are experiencing symptoms in which the epicenter of discomfort is your throat, you may have another type of reflux referred to as laryngopharyngeal reflux (LPR), or throatburn reflux. The presence of throatburn reflux doesn''t mean you''re clear of any gastrointestinal acid reflux red flags; in fact, more often than not, a person experiencing throatburn reflux still has heartburn reflux--they just don''t know it, because they can''t feel it. This is because the esophageal tissues have likely been exposed to acid for such a length of time that they''ve been numbed to its effects. This is a symptom of chronic inflammation (discussed in chapter 3). Only an examination of your esophagus could tell for sure if you have heartburn reflux without knowing it. Undetected or apparent heartburn reflux, or the nagging throat-centered symptoms, can disrupt your sleep, interfere with your enjoyment of food, annoy your significant other, and affect your energy and activity levels. If, like many of my patients, your voice or public speaking is a source of income, even your livelihood may be affected. What most people don''t realize is that their symptoms are the result of years'' and sometimes decades'' worth of damage that has deteriorated cellular integrity and function, initiated disease-causing chronic inflammation, and, in the most serious cases, created conditions for an aggressive and increasingly common form of cancer of the esophagus. While you may not hear a lot about it now, esophageal cancer will be making news headlines in the years to come--unless we do something to stop it. The good news is that it''s completely within your power to put an end to the symptoms caused by refluxed acid and to curtail the type of internal damage that can leave your esophagus vulnerable to cancer. The solution lies in your diet and learning how to use a different type of measurement than you''re accustomed to in order to gauge whether a food or beverage is "good" or "bad" for you. Instead of letting calories, carbohydrates, or fat dictate your dietary choices, the Acid Watcher Diet will teach you to use a substance''s acidity or pH value to determine whether it will be harmful or healing to you. This practice, which I call being an Acid Watcher, will help you take back control of your health by alleviating symptoms associated with acid reflux without requiring long-term reliance on over-the-counter or prescription medication. Whether you realize it or not, you already know a little something about this approach to eliminating symptoms of acid reflux. Have you ever noticed, through trial and error, that certain foods "trigger" your reflux? And that eliminating them has produced some relief, even if it''s temporary? Then you''ve been an Acid Watcher in training all along. What you probably don''t know is that the common understanding of trigger foods doesn''t take into account some of the most popular and frequently consumed foods that can cause and worsen acid reflux. You may have been ingesting these foods and beverages every day for months, even years, without knowing that they''re contributing to your reflux symptoms. Worse, they could have caused enough damage at this point that your esophagus has been numbed to the effects of refluxed acid--which is why your heartburn symptoms have mysteriously disappeared, while your throat symptoms have flared up. The substances I''m talking about are processed foods and beverages, and not just any processed foods, but those that have been infused with an invisible chemical known as dietary acid. Many of your favorite items that line the shelves of your grocery store have been acidified, by nature and by chemical process, which means so have you. When dietary acid is added to foods and drinks, the result is a diminished pH value and consequently a greater toxicity to your internal tissues. Most vulnerable to this toxicity is the lining of your esophagus, which is the small tube through which all substances pass before they reach your stomach (you''ll learn more about the esophagus in chapter 2). How Dietary Acid Slipped into Your Every Snack and Meal Dietary acid is in many of the most commonly consumed foods and drinks, even though you probably don''t know it''s there. It''s in canned and jarred soups and vegetables especially if they''ve been pickled, marinated, or fermented. It is in all carbonated beverages and industrially produced fruit juices. It''s present in every product that contains high-fructose corn syrup, even in items that don''t seem to be sweet at all. This ubiquitous and overused sweetener is produced using sulfuric acid and you''ll find it in the most unexpected places, such as in condiments, barbecue sauces, cocktail sauces, spice mixes, even baby food. You''ll find dietary acid in breads, salad dressings, juices, yogurts, and candy bars, and in the most deleterious acidic substance of all: soda. And that includes all sugar-free and colorless varieties such as flavored seltzer water, which so many health watchers and dieters falsely presume to be safe. When you consume, on a daily basis, foods and beverages that contain dietary acid, you invite acid damage into your body. The consequence of letting this seemingly innocuous damage continue eventually turns into more than a postmeal nuisance that a few antacids can control. Using Food to Heal--and Prevent--Acid Damage Changing how we eat and what we eat will hasten the healing, recovery, and prevention of acid reflux. The important first step in reversal and prevention of acid damage is to understand where acid originates in our food supply. One general rule to remember is that the more processed the food is, the more severely it is going to exacerbate acid damage to your aerodigestive tract and beyond. (Aerodigestive is a medical term for the anatomic pathway from your mouth to your stomach, including your vocal cords, windpipe, and lungs.) An easy way to gauge the level of processing is to consider how likely you would be to find an item growing on a farm, whether from a tree or plant or in the soil, or in a stream. For example, could you pluck an Oreo as though fruit from a tree, or unearth a bushel of fresh-grown spicy nacho cheese chips? Not in a million years. Will you ever stumble upon a refreshing Coca-Cola-filled creek? Only if you''re in a game of Candy Land. It might sound silly, but this thought exercise can be a practical process of elimination when you''re selecting what to eat and drink each day. Of course, an easier way to know what to eat is to follow the eating plan you''ll find in this book. The Acid Watch

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