Smoking, diabetes mellitus, and obesity as risk factors of gastroesophageal reflux disease and extraesophageal symptoms of gastroesophageal reflux disease: A case-control study

Abstract

Background: Gastroesophageal reflux disease (GERD) is a spectrum of disease usually producing symptoms of heartburn and acid regurgitation. Its prevalence in general population is about 12–17% worldwide. There are many suggested risk factors for GERD. Aim and Objective: This study was conducted to find out whether smoking, diabetes mellitus (DM), and obesity are risk factors of GERD and to find out the extraesophageal symptoms of GERD. Materials and Methods: This is a case–control study matched for age done in 46 GERD patients who were cases and 92 subjects with dyspepsia who were not having GERD as controls. The statistical analysis was done to find out proportions and odds ratio (OR) with 95% confidence interval (CI). Results: Most of the study subjects were in the age group of 40–49 years. About 59% were males. About 14% were smokers and 25% were diabetics. OR for smoking, DM, and obesity was 3.706, 5.571, and 3.618, respectively. About 28% of the GERD patients had easy tiredness. Conclusion: In this study, smoking and DM were found to be the risk factors of GERD based on OR with 95% CI. The most frequent extraesophageal symptom among GERD patients was found to be tiredness.