What to do if you have esophageal burns and chest pain when eating

If eating causes esophageal burns and chest pain, the first thing to do is to take calm measures to relieve the pain in time and avoid further damage. If the symptoms persist or worsen, you need to see a doctor as soon as possible. Common treatment measures include local cooling, adjusting diet and medication.

1Relieve emergency symptoms

After the esophagus is burned, you should immediately cool down the burned area by drinking cold water or ice cubes to relieve pain and inflammation, but avoid excessive cold stimulation to avoid spasms. Drinking a moderate amount of cold water slowly in small sips can help relieve symptoms.

2Diet care

During the recovery period of burns, you should avoid eating spicy, overheated, hard or irritating foods. Eat mainly liquid or soft foods at appropriate temperatures, such as warm rice porridge, bread slices softened in warm water, loofah soup, etc., to protect and reduce friction and irritation to the esophagus. This helps reduce re-injury and promote healing.

3. Medication and medical advice

Mild burns can be treated by taking honey water orally to repair the mucosa. Oral proton pump inhibitors such as omeprazole can also be taken to reduce gastric acid secretion and reduce the stimulation of gastric acid on esophageal damage, which helps relieve symptoms. However, if chest pain is obvious, swallowing is difficult, or accompanied by severe vomiting, fever and other symptoms, you should go to the hospital as soon as possible. The doctor may arrange an endoscopic examination to rule out severe burns, and give antibiotics to prevent infection or mucosal repair drugs such as compound aluminum hydroxide as appropriate.

After the condition is under control, you should avoid eating hot food again to prevent the burn from recurring. With the above methods, minor esophageal burns can usually heal on their own within a few days, but if the symptoms continue to worsen, medical treatment is a key step.