Guide To Gastritis Symptoms

Tar-Like Stool

Many of the underlying causes of gastritis can cause patients to experience damage to the blood vessels that supply the lining of the stomach with oxygenated blood. Some of these causes include excessive stomach acid production, drinking too much alcohol, long term use of nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, and autoimmune disorders. When blood leaks from the damaged blood vessels in the lining of an individual's stomach, it will continue to move through the digestive tract if it is not excreted through vomiting.

As blood from the stomach moves through the small and large intestine, it starts to clot due to the amount of time it has been outside of the bloodstream. This clotted blood combines with stool and is then excreted from the individual's body. The partially clotted blood in the stool can cause it to have a black or dark brown tar-like appearance.

Hiccups

A hiccup is a sudden contraction or spasm of the diaphragm. This spasm produces a shaking motion of the individual's chest and abdominal muscles and the closing of the glottis immediately after. When individual experiences this mechanism, they generate a sound of air being forcibly expelled from their lungs that is characterized as a hiccup. Hiccups can be triggered when the stomach of a gastritis patient becomes enlarged from swelling.

Hiccups may also be triggered when an individual's throat or esophagus becomes swollen from an overproduction of stomach acid that has caused gastritis. These causes of hiccups may occur because the brain has sensed a decrease in carbon dioxide levels in the blood. The mechanical action of vomiting that is caused by gastritis can produce irritation in an individual's phrenic nerve, the nerve that connects the diaphragm to the brain, which can trigger hiccups.