Odd symptoms and no diagnosis

[jc17263]

I'm a 40yr old male, 180lbs, non-smoker, non-drink, no drug use, no other health issues.

About once a month (for the past year) I get these attacks/episodes with hypertension 150/100+, shivering, and sternum/stomach pain. Sometimes I will also get tachycardia, cold hand/feet, severe dizziness, blurred vision, and exhaustion.

The days following the attacks I will have lots of loud and constant gas movements after eating, hard to pass gas, hard to pass stool, constant stomach pain after eating.

I've seen many specialists and done many, many tests no one seems to be able to figure out what's going on. Just checking to see if anyone else has this or aware of it.

Thanks,
Jon

[JamesPH]

Hi Jon,
Were you tested for: POTS w/tilt-table test, autonomic dysfunction, and other neurological issues? Also, do you drink soda and other sugary beverages (specifically, more than 30 grams of sugar/day)? Regarding tachycardia/hypertension, it has been shown recently to strongly correlate to GERD. The hypotheses are that either the same neurological issue can affect both (heart and stomach/esophagus), or that GERD symptoms (w/other gastro issues like you mentioned) can cause inflammation and "pull" on other tissues. including the heart Cheers!

[jc17263]

Hi James,

I've been diagnosed with POTS during one of my inpatient stays via orthostatic vitals and a telemetry machine. However, no DR (PCP, cardio) has prescribed anything or has any follow up on this. Really, no one even mentions it during any of my interactions.

No soda in years and no alcohol or smoking ever but I'm not sure if I get more than 30 g of sugar daily.

I've had a nissan fundoplication in 07 to fix GERD and a hiatal hernia and another nissan in Feb of this year to repair a recurrent hiatal hernia found during one of my ED trips. From my understanding I shouldn't be able to have GERD or other refluxes but I have read a lot about the links between heart and digestive issues.

I had a neurologist visit during one of my inpatient stays and he said none of my symptoms were anything neurologists deal with. I asked about the vagas nerve, etc but he insisted this wasn't his territory. He did do a quick physical and went over my tests and said he didn't see anything he was aware of.

Thanks for your help!
Jon

[JamesPH]

Hi Jon,
It's unfortunate that today's medical community is highly fragmented--neurologists don't deal much with heart issues or gastro issues, and the general practitioner is more familiar with all sorts of systemic issues, but often doesn't really specialize in anything. So the primary caregiver writes scripts to the specialists who don't really look at the body as a whole. If you have time, there's a DC in California (he used to teach anatomy) who has tons of wonderful information on YouTube--everything from neurology to immunology and just about everything in between. If you type in Dr. John Bergman into YouTube or go to his website, I think you'll be happy to see his discussions. Another Dr. who looks at the body as a whole is Dr. Eric Berg.
Hope you get some answers soon. I know how stressful it is going from one doctor to the next having symptoms or pain and not getting any good answers.
Jim