Image via CrunchBaseThey’re among the most widely prescribed medications in the world. They’re reasonably safe for most people to take. That’s why drugs that reduce stomach acid — used to combat heartburn, acid reflux and ulcers — don’t get much scrutiny from doctors, or from patients.
“When patients were admitted to our geriatric wards, a lot of them didn’t have clear indications for taking these drugs,” said Dr. Ian Logan, a Scottish physician and co-author of a recent editorial on acid suppressants in the journal Age and Ageing. “And they’d remained on them for a lot longer than they should have.” One of his patients had been taking an acid-reducer for 15 years.
Dr. Logan and two colleagues with Britain’s National Health Service decided to sound the alarm — rather, to sound it once more, as researchers began discovering problems with these drugs years ago. “They do have significant side effects, especially in older patients,” Dr. Logan told me in an interview.
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