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Severe acid reflux following gastric bypass

I had gastric bypass almost four years ago.  A few months after surgery I had some complications with pain, heart burn and nasuea.  After tests, no problem was found and it was suspected that I had an ulcer.  This got somewhat better, but over the next few months I had several bouts with acid reflux at night where acid came up in my throat and into my lungs.  It would usually take several days to recoup from these episodes.  Finally, I had an episode that was very severe and what I coughed up looked greenish yellow and I inhaled a lot of this substance.  I ended up having a lung infection.  When an upper GI was done by my original bypass surgeon, it was discovered that I had had an ulcer and it had pushed thru my staple line.  I had an opening in my staple line the size of your pinky fingernail.  At that time, I was the only person at the Duke Weight Loss Surgery Center that had ever had this happen.  I have been much better, but still have episodes of severe acid reflux where the acid comes back up in my throat and most of the time some ends up being inhaled as it usually happens when I go to sleep.  I think it is happening when I eat too late or don't chew well enough.  This week I had an episode after going to sleep sitting up in my chair (not a recliner), so now I'm worried that something is still wrong.  

Has anyone had similar problems ... I haven't talked with anyone else that has.  Thanks for any help!


This discussion is related to Problems after Gastric Bypass surgery.
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Avatar universal
I notice all the questions on here are older. So I'll post my situation and see if anyone is having the same problem.
Little history of my life of Gerd. 18 years ago I had surgery for acid reflux. The one where they do the wrap. It worked. Then I got up to 288 and decided to have gastric sleeve surgery. After the surgery my acid reflux came back. The doctors told me the only fix would be to have gastric bypass surgery. It's worse now. Any suggestions or ideas on what my next step is to curing this?
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I am having problems, had gastric revision 2013 had complications, they did the sleeve but something went wrong and they had to go back in and the ro in y. spent one month in the hospital and almost died. now i am having severe reflux problems so bad it is causing cysts in my throat. Dr keeps telling me to double my meds but now having other problems due to the increase in meds.  having weight gain again and depression. caused osteoporosis and arthritis. Dr's still cant figure things out so i suffer.  
Avatar universal
I wanted to have the gastric sleeve and my heart has been set on this some time. I was very disappointed when I was told I had acid reflux. I was told this after I had my Scope done. The surgeon tells me sine I have esophageal issues that I wasn't aware of that I need the gastric by-pass. I still don't understand why bypass?
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Don't fall for that. I had the sleeve first 9 months ago. Acid reflux was so bad that they converted me to the gastric bypass as my only option. This will fix it they said. Negative. It has only gotten worse. No matter what I do or how much meds I take. I go back Wednesday of this week to have test ran.
Avatar universal
I'm about 5 weeks out from my gastric bypass surgery and am having quite a bit of acid reflux problems.(all else is going pretty well tho')  I'm trying to not eat too late or eat anything that might generate the acid, but it's awful when it wakes me up at night... I feel like I'm breathing through mud and the spit-up is foamy with yellow acid.  I had/have a hiatial hernia that has been around for years but the gerd was managed before surgery - it showed up on an ultrasound pre-op but no one said anything other than it was there.  

I've talked to the bariatric nurse and she says things like, "hmmm, I don't know why it would be doing that".  Yay!  That's helpful.  She did talk with the doctor - who told me to take my omeprezole 2x a day but it's not really helping that much...

Hopefully it settles down and I can wait till my 3-month follow-up but if not, I'll have to go in sooner.  Unfortunately, I live 3-hours away from Seattle... so appointments are difficult - ugh!
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Avatar universal
I am up because my husband is having this same problem right now and he also had his surgery at DWLSC. He had his surgery about 18 months ago and this is his second episode. Thanks for posting, now we know to go get tested to make sure there is no ulcer.
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Avatar universal
I've had the same exact problem. I think I am FINALLY going to talk to my Primary and see if I can get a referral to the Gastro Doc
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