How to understand that you have a sick stomach

Stom­ach pain is dis­com­fort or any oth­er unpleas­ant sen­sa­tion that is famil­iar to all of us. And this is influ­enced by a lot of fac­tors, includ­ing sus­cep­ti­bil­i­ty to food, hered­i­ty, and so on.

Most caus­es of abdom­i­nal pain are not cause for con­cern, and your doc­tor can eas­i­ly diag­nose and help treat the con­di­tion. Some­times, on the con­trary, it can be a sign of seri­ous dis­eases that require med­ical atten­tion.

Types of abdominal pain

There are sev­er­al types of pain, depend­ing on how quick­ly it starts and how long it lasts, and what ill­ness it accom­pa­nies:

1. Acute short-term (several seconds)

It occurs when you inhale or a sud­den change in body posi­tion. Most often, such pain is typ­i­cal for spasms of the diaphragm that occur due to inflam­ma­tion or cir­cu­la­to­ry dis­or­ders.

2. Sharp, sudden

It is caused by poi­son­ing or chem­i­cal burns of the mucous mem­branes. If the pain is sim­ply unbear­able “as if some­thing had pierced the body”, then most like­ly this is a con­se­quence of per­fo­ra­tion of the ulcer.

3. Spasmodic, cramping

If you come to the doc­tor with such pain, he will imme­di­ate­ly assume that you have inflam­ma­tion of the duo­de­num or an ulcer. This pain often both­ers at night or a few hours after the last meal.

4. Strong cramping

The like­li­hood that you picked up some of the gas­troin­testi­nal infec­tions.

5. Burning sensation

This feel­ing is char­ac­ter­is­tic of gas­tri­tis or ulcers. But dull aching pain in the stom­ach is a sign of the same dis­eases, but already in a chron­ic or ini­tial form. With gas­tri­tis, there is a clear con­nec­tion with meals: the pain man­i­fests itself either imme­di­ate­ly after eat­ing, or when a per­son is pret­ty hun­gry.

6. Constant aching

This pain is very dan­ger­ous because it is char­ac­ter­is­tic of malig­nant neo­plasms, as well as stom­ach polyps. If the can­cer spreads to the pan­creas, the pain becomes gir­dle.

7. Severe pain in the navel

At first you feel it in the navel or a lit­tle to the right, and after a few hours the pain is already in the right upper abdomen. It speaks of appen­dici­tis.

This is not the whole list of types of pain, but it is uni­ver­sal, and there­fore, most like­ly, you can guess what caused your dis­com­fort. But you should not bring to such a state, but pay atten­tion to the har­bin­gers of dis­eases. And go to the doc­tor imme­di­ate­ly when it seems that some­thing is wrong, and not pull to the last.

Signs you have stomach problems

Whether it’s an uncom­fort­able sen­sa­tion or severe cramp­ing, there can be many rea­sons for stom­ach pain. For exam­ple, you may have indi­ges­tion, con­sti­pa­tion, a stom­ach virus, or even men­stru­al cramps. But below we have com­piled a list of the most vis­i­ble signs that your health is not all right:

• loss of appetite;
• desire to eat strange ined­i­ble objects;
• nau­sea, pro­longed vom­it­ing (yel­low or green­ish, pos­si­bly with blood clots);
• bad breath, belch­ing air with an unpleas­ant or rot­ten smell;
• signs of infec­tion with worms;
• feel­ing of heav­i­ness in the abdomen, full­ness of the stom­ach;
• bloat­ing, rum­bling in the abdomen;
• intol­er­ance to dairy prod­ucts;
• increased acid­i­ty, belch­ing sour;
• annoy­ing heart­burn;
• severe peri­od­ic pain in the stom­ach area;
• hic­cups.

Why can the stomach hurt?

There are many rea­sons for stom­ach pain. It can come from any of the organs in the abdomen—the gall­blad­der, pan­creas, liv­er, stom­ach, and intestines—or from the abdom­i­nal wall, the out­er shell of the body. Some­times you feel pain in your stom­ach, but it’s actu­al­ly com­ing from your chest, back, or pelvis.

Abdom­i­nal wall pain is a com­mon and easy-to-miss symp­tom as health­care pro­fes­sion­als may direct their atten­tion to inter­nal organs as the cause of the pain. But once the abdom­i­nal wall is sus­pect­ed, the diag­no­sis is usu­al­ly easy to make. If the patient tens­es the mus­cles of the abdom­i­nal wall dur­ing exer­cise, he may tell the doc­tor that he has pain on the right side of the abdomen. Obvi­ous­ly, this pain is not caused by prob­lems with an inter­nal organ such as the gall­blad­der or stom­ach.

Health care providers can often deter­mine where the pain is com­ing from by tak­ing a detailed his­to­ry from you. Depend­ing on the doc­tor’s style, some may ask you to sim­ply tell the med­ical his­to­ry in your own words. Oth­er doc­tors may pre­fer to ask a series of more detailed ques­tions. Some­one can use both meth­ods.

The med­ical his­to­ry is of para­mount impor­tance, even more impor­tant than the phys­i­cal exam­i­na­tion. After col­lect­ing infor­ma­tion and a phys­i­cal exam­i­na­tion, cer­tain diag­nos­tic tests may be rec­om­mend­ed to make an accu­rate diag­no­sis, such as an ultra­sound.

What are the most common causes of abdominal pain?

Since there are many organs in the abdomen, pain can be caused by a vari­ety of prob­lems. Dis­com­fort may also come from adja­cent areas such as the chest and pelvis. Caus­es of abdom­i­nal pain include:

• diges­tive prob­lems;
• Con­sti­pa­tion;
• Gas;
• Indi­ges­tion;
• prob­lems with the abdom­i­nal cav­i­ty;
• Appen­dici­tis;
• Food poi­son­ing;
• food aller­gy;
• Diver­ti­c­uli­tis;
• gall­stones;
• Gas­troe­sophageal reflux dis­ease (GERD);
• Her­nia;
• Inflam­ma­to­ry bow­el dis­ease;
• Stones in the kid­neys;
• stom­ach flu (gas­troen­teri­tis);
• Ulcers;
• Prob­lems with the pelvic organs;
• Endometrio­sis;
• Men­stru­al cramps;
• ovar­i­an cysts;
• Inflam­ma­to­ry dis­eases of the pelvic organs;
• Uri­nary tract infec­tions;
• chest prob­lems;
• blood clots in the lungs;
• Heart attack;
• Pneu­mo­nia.

What is the difference between abdominal pain in children?

About 15% of chil­dren aged 5 to 16 expe­ri­ence per­sis­tent or recur­rent abdom­i­nal pain. Often, this is due to con­sti­pa­tion or gas­tri­tis (after all, at this age, chips are tasti­er for them than moth­er’s borscht). Oth­er com­mon caus­es of abdom­i­nal pain in chil­dren include:

• Appen­dici­tis.
• GERD;
• Aller­gy to milk (lac­tose intol­er­ance);
• Sore throat;
• Uri­nary tract infec­tion (UTI).

It is impor­tant to remem­ber that if you your­self do not wor­ry about your health, then no one will do this instead of you. Our beau­ty and mood direct­ly depend on how we feel, so take care of your­self!

Author: Oksana Leshchenko