Acid reflux might be cause of kids’ runny noses, specialists say

Children who have acid reflux are commonly misdiagnosed and prescribed medication — when there is a simple fix, say the authors of the new book Acid Reflux in Children: How Healthy Eating Can Fix Your Child’s Asthma, Allergies, Obesity, Nasal Congestion, Cough & Croup.”

“Reflux in children is poorly understood, even by pediatricians and other medical specialties,” writes Dr. Jamie Koufman, one of the authors of the book and a leading expert in acid reflux in children, in the book’s introduction.

She’s coined the term “respiratory reflux,” because the reflux may affect any and all parts of the respiratory tract, she writes.

“Your pediatrician or even a specialist might have told you that your child has asthma, sinusitis or allergy, when in fact, s/he has reflux,” writes Koufman, founder and director of the Voice Institute of New York.

The authors aim to educate parents and providers alike about what they’ve learned through decades of treating children, and the good news is that their solution is simple: change the kids’ diet. They offer dozens of recipes in the book.

“For us, we thought the recipes should be fun,” said Dr. Julie Wei, one of the book’s co-authors and the chief of the Division of Otolaryngology and an ear, nose, throat surgeon at Nemours Children’s Hospital. “I'm food-obsessed. The recipes are meant to help families to try out something different.”

Here’s a condensed version of an interview with Wei.

Acid reflux comes from a diet that is high in sugar. It happens when kids put a lot of acidic food in the mouth. Meat and dairy are acidic. And a lot of foods are acidified to have a longer shelf life.

Juice is also acidic. A lot of parents don’t think there’s anything wrong with their kids drinking a lot juice or Gatorade. They think juice is the same as fruits. But it’s not. Juice is a Niagara Fall of acid.

When kids are crying and they’re given sugar water or sugary drinks, they stop crying, because sugar goes to the brain and it feels good. But it’s feeding these bad habits early on that can set the pace for the future.

The reason my passion has been on this topic is that I saw a 7-year-old who was perfectly healthy but he couldn't swallow. His parents said three months ago he stopped eating solid food. He won’t eat meat. He only drinks PediaSure and yogurt. But he doesn’t want to eat food.

So I asked the mom to take What causes acid reflux in kids?

So let’s talk about the symptoms. How can parents know if their children have acid reflux? Staff Writer