Re: , 12

[Guest guest]

Hello and Patty,

My name is Steve White, and I've been living with EG for over two years

now. I am 27 years old. I lived in the Minneapolis area when my EG was

first discovered, and was sick for almost 6 weeks before a diagnosis was

made. Not having a regular doctor at the time, I saw 6 different urgent

care docs, and each of them did not know what was going on. I was

prescribed prilosec, and that did not help me at all. Before diagnosis,

the

only thing that made me feel better was not eating. After I was

diagnosed,

the steroid treatments did wonders, and now prednisone treatments bring

flare-ups under control.

I noticed (from the bottle) that the side effects of prilosec in some

patients include stomach pain, and I'm not convinced that this drug

didn't

contribute to my misery before I was diagnosed.

It is meant to control

stomach acid, and I'm also not convinced that contoling stomach acid

helps

the EG symptoms.

I wanted to pass on the names of the doctor I saw who finally figured

this

out. His name is Dr. at Digestive Healthcare, which is

located

near Abbot Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis. Since I moved away, I

have

been seeing Dr. Schwartz at the Mayo Clinic dept of gastroenterology,

who

also seems genuinely interested in learning more about my case and

trying

out different treatments. I want to stress the importance of finding a

doctor who will listen to your concerns, be willing to try different

treatments, and who has seen EG before. Because it is so rare, most

doctors do not know much about it, and may have a harder time. (Please

let

me know if you'd like phone numbers.)

I have never found any kind of root cause for my case of EG, and I still

have not dicovered anything, food or otherwise, that I am allergic to. I

had a scratch test done at Mayo last year which did not uncover

anything.

I have been taking Singulair, which is normally used to treat asthma,

for

six months now, and this is the longest time yet I've spent between

flare-ups. Dr. Schwartz thought it might help; you may want to ask your

doctor about it.

Hang in there! Hope this is helpful, and let me know if you'd like more

information.

Steve White

stephen_white@...