[Nationwide epidemiological survey regarding heartburn and reflux esophagitis in Japanese].

The details on prevalence of heartburn and reflux esophagitis have not been clarified, since no large-scale survey has been conducted to date. Accordingly, we conducted the nationwide survey regarding prevalence of heartburn and reflux esophagitis by asking new outpatients and patients with the first endoscopy to be performed who visited the medical institutions participating in this survey to fill out the questionnaire and undergo endoscopy. The result showed that heartburn was reported from 1,994 patients (42.2%) out of 4,723, and reflux esophagitis classified as grade A-D was reported from 602 patients (16.7%) out of 3,608. Meanwhile, fat intake, sweet food and anti-inflammatory analgesics were proven to be causes of heart-burn. Furthermore, frequency of heartburn and severity of reflux esophagitis were slightly correlated, although those were not necessarily obviously related.