i'm arthel nefl. time now for "sunday housecall." >> and i'm eric shawn. welcome as always. joining us is dr. marc siegel. he's also the author of the inner pulse. professor of id samadi. urology and chief of robotic jrge. good to see you. >> good to see you. >> we begin with breaking news. news that president obama has been diagnosed apparently with acid reflux. this happened yesterday after he complained of a sore throat. it means he's going to be on

nexium and prilosec and has to watch the amount of wine he drinks and all that. >> his doctor said he does drink occasionally at least, moderately. he's a former smoker which is definitely correlated with acid reflux disease and got off of cigarettes with nicotine gum. it's actually not what people think. it's not that there's a lot of acid in the gi tract. it's that the muscle that controls d controls die decision, it gets loosened. if you eat a lot of fatty foods or fried foods, that can increase your risk. on the other hand, if you drink a lot of water, if you exercise a lot, if you drink a lot of water, if you lose weight, you

decrease the problem with acid reflux. if you do all of those things, and they don't work, then you start talking about medication like nexium to decrease the amount of acid in your stomach. >> is it related to stress? >> i think it's completely relatesed to stress. alcohol, coffee, cigarette smoking. the cat scan he has, i'm going to steal his line, that cat scan he had would not be approved under obamacare. we didn't examine him. if you see swelling there, that's what's called extra heartburn reflux. people think if i don't have that heartburn, i can't have reflux. you can. >> i was just going to say, it's so common now. why is it so common? is is there a way to avoid getting it?

>> the question is how did they come up with the diagnosis of acid reflux. what he had first was a sore throat. so he started with a sore throat and what i want people to know is that sometimes when acid actually find its way all the way up to the e soft gas, it can e irritate the vocal cords. the other one can be chest pain. you can have similar symptoms as having a heart attack and that could be as a result of acid reflux. they got a cat scan because there was some swelling, they were worried about other things. everything turned out to be negative except for irritation as a result of this. the food, as it goes down to your stomach, it's supposed to be a one-way valve. anything that increases the pressure in the stomach can go against that muscle or something that would relax that muscle. one of the things talk about

prevention, when you have a lot of fatty food, chocolate, alcohol, smoking, citrus food. it relaxes that muscle and causes acid reflux. now, as a surgeon, i would also tell you one of the other things that's very common is a hernia. it's the herniation of stomach up in the diaphragm muscle. that can cause acid reflux. the reason why it's so common now days is because obesity is on the rise. we are eating very late at night. the way to prevent this going back to what you were asking, small meals, if you wait two to three hours before you go to bed. lift the head of the bed. >> yeah. >> and i know he's a huge fan of h2 blockers, i think he has a great outcome. i don't think these medications are the first line of treatment. i think things such as baking soda for example that

neutralizes the acid. >> baking soda or whatever? what do you do? >> some people have it more severely than others. you can be coughing or hoarseness or sore throat or gurgling in your throat. it's the number two or three cause of coughing, chronic cough. it could be asthma or reflux. with 15 million people in the united states having this problem every single day, we dwot to be looking for it. >> i think we're overtreating with medications. you can try gum, you can try baking soda. you can modify -- >> how do you do it? >> two spoons in the water, warm water, that can neutralize the acid. changing your lifestyle, getting more fruits and vegetables and certainly this time of the year is very critical. because we are heading toward -- >> also a question about cancer.

can acid reflux -- >> absolutely. by the way, that's one of the reasons that some people need these medications. >> does it increase -- >> it increases your risk of esophageal cancer, the medications decrease your risks. to david's point, if you stop the medications, you get a rebound acid. >> you can't take nexium or prilosec for the rest of your life. >> we got to make sure we give it to people that really need it. those at risk have to be on it. >> how do you get off of it? >> you wean off. >> when you're on them for a long time, you actually need the acid, not only for digest chun. when you're on them for a long

time, you may see a low vitamin 3 b12 which is a form of anemia. we actually did a segment not too long ago -- >> what's a long time? >> these are meant to be on for maybe two weeks, to six months is a long time. >> it depends on the patient, though. >> of course. if somebody's not doing well, medication is the treatment. when your b12 starts to go down, you see similar symptoms of alzheimer's, lack of energy, anemia. i want people to be careful about overtreating. >> to this point, calcium too. calcium absorption goes down if you don't have an acid enough stomach. so you take these medications, it interferes with also calcium

absorptio absorption. >> so don't eat so late, stay away from fatty food. anything that will increase the pressure in the abdomen can cause it. have one glass of red line. it's holidays and i don't want to spoil the mood. >> thank you. it's fascinating. so many people have it so i'm glad we discuss this. injuries are inevitably a part of any sport. up next, the new warning about head trauma and its potentially devastating effects. ght, so thil arthritis lasts 8 hours but aleve can last 12 hours. and aleve is proven to work better on pain than tylenol arthritis. so why am i still thinking about this? how are ya? good. aleve. proven better on pain.

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welcome back. the death of a college football star now shedding new light

about the devastating effects of head injuries. the 22-year-old ohio state player kosta karageorge was found dead days after he texted his mother about suffering from severe concussions. if you could talk to us about the short term and long term effects of concussions on the brain. >> whether it's as a result of car accident or football players, we see about a million of these cases coming in every year in this country. about 300,000 of them have long-term consequences. whenever you have some sort of a concussion or attack on the brain, you will have deceleration and acceleration. there will be some trauma and swelling of the brain. the brain consists of 100 billion nerves surrounded by fluid and the skull. and there's really not any room to play with.

any shock, any attack, push on that brain can cause a problem. so just like degenerative disease of the knees, the trauma that over time people get arthritis, the same kind of trauma on the spine, we will have the same kind of trauma on the brain as a result of these attack. cells start to become degenerative. areas of the brain which is responsible for emotions, for rainfall, for passion, for sexual drive, all of those will become out of sync and the person will feel that. short term, they may feel diseadizzy, headache, nausea. the best thing is to pull those players out. long term what we're finding out from a lot of canadian studies and other places is that these degenerative cells won't function well.

that will set them up for depression, suicidal ideas, always i'mers, parkinson's. it's a real trauma to the brain we're see sfwing. >> before i get to this, i want to emphasize a point david just made. it's a three time greater risk of depression and suicide and violent behavior. that applies both to the karageorge case and maybe even ray rice. it may be that this has got to be looked at from a neurological point of view. with our high schoolers, they looked at 24 high schoolers and put something to measure head impact in the helmets. this is nonconcussion. this is just the regular blows of a football game. he found that all 24 high schoolers had brain impact, brain damage to the white matter of the brain.

i think that all football players out there of any kind should have these head impact measurers on the helmet. let's face it, the philosophy of football is lower your head and charge forward. that head is not supposed to be an impact device. younger people even more so. >> it's a good point, because the elmets that they wear, it only protects the soft tissue, not real brain damage. there are more and more studies coming up with mris and cats scans that they're finding out certain proteins that's responsible for slowing down the brain is found in these type of patients that have repeated trauma to the brain. it causes the same exhaustion, brain start to slow down just the way a computer freezes. and you move the mouse and it doesn't work, it's the same idea. you slow down the memory. you don't remember the names.

i'm trying to think of -- >> yeah. is there any real other than football -- >> anybody that has head impact. if you had these head impact devices, you could say, the readings are going up too high, better pull them off the field. >> there's no other occupation out there apart from sports. >> construction workers. >> there is also a two-minute test they have. a lot of coaches are using it now. they pull the players out and they start making you count backwards or test your memory quickly. if there's any doubt, you sit on the bench. the game is becoming more and more competitive, the coaches are pushing the players and that's dangerous. sit on the bench until you have a -- >> those monitors sound very important. some doctors say it's your best defense against a painful disease.

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getting the slingles shot, he recommended against it. what is your advice? >> first, i want to issue a correction. it is not measles you have to worry about. it is whether you've had chicken pox. actually the centers for disease control has found 99% of the people over the age of 40 have

had chicken pox. it is not that somebody comes to me and i check for chicken pox to make sure they are exposed. if you're over the age of 60 i want you to have the shingles vaccine if you are not immuno compromised. if you're pregnant. it is a live virus vaccine. listen to this -- it works 50% of the time. like here's the big payoff. it decreases your risk of post-herpetic neuralgia. it is usually in a band-like form with little bit offers and redness. follows your nerves because the chicken pox virus was hiding in your nerves all those years. >> can you explain that? >> if you had chicken pox you can get shingles. if you haven't had chicken pox, you're going to get chicken pox

as an adult. most of us have had chicken pox or the viccen pox vaccine so if it resurfaces, it is going to be shingles. the vaccine for post-herpetic neurwe neuragia. after the herpes infection the rash goes away. pain in the area where the rash was. you get rid of the rash but you still got the pain. >> bottom line, it is a good c vaccine after the age of 60. it works for years. it is a one-time deal. if you hadn't had chicken pox, you shall get this vaccine. you may get a soreness or rash. if you get the vaccine and you get a rash you don't want to be around kids because maybe you would be putting them in danger. people who are leukemia,immuno .

the virus would be in the nerve along the path of the muscle. when it acts up, all these little bit offers and rash will be around the same area. once it is gone the pain may stay there for months after that. that is extremely painful. that's why we recommend that you get this vaccine. >> are some people more likely to get it than others? >> most people who have had chicken pox probably are covered. but as marc mentioned, 99% of the people who may or may not think they've had chicken pox, they probably have had it. >> we think stress increases your risk of getting it and other illnesses will bring it out. if you're bombarded with some other infection or stress, you can get it.

>> well, it can be triggered by all sorts of things, especially stress. speak something of, but there is a wrong way and a right way to deal with it. listen up, because coming up we're going to talk about what not to do during a panic attack. ♪ ah, push it. ♪ ♪ push it. ♪ p...push it real good! ♪ ♪ ow! ♪ oooh baby baby...baby baby. if you're salt-n-pepa, you tell people to push it. ♪ push it real good. it's what you do. ♪ ah. push it. if you want to save fifteen percent or more on car insurance, you switch to geico. it's what you do. ♪ ah. push it. i'm pushing. i'm pushing it real good!

ght, so this tylenol arthritis lasts 8 hours but aleve can last 12 hours. and aleve is proven to work better on pain than tylenol arthritis. so why am i still thinking about this? how are ya? good. aleve. proven better on pain.

apparently it can happen to anyone at any time. i'm talking about panic attack. what you do in the moment right when it is happening can make all the difference. first of all, how do you even know if you're having a panic attack? >> a simple way. look right here. my good friend, dr. siegel. >> he makes me panic. >> people who have panic attack, you would recognize it immediately. they're sweating, grasping for air, they're almost suffocating and it comes very sudden. sometimes it can be genetics, sometimes it can be a learned response as a result of some tragic event that's happened. there are also some medical issues that can cause panic attack. one is severe reflux. we just talked about. magnesium and zinc deficiency is another one. asthmatic patients sometimes can be grasping for air, they can go into panic attack. it is not always psychological.

sometimes heart disease, mitral valve prolapse can cause that. always remember that. first you recognize it and you stop saying, hey, relax. you'll be fine. that's not going to work. there are ways to really tell them that you're there for them to support them but there are also things that we can give them. there are some gaba medications, yoga -- >> what's a gabba? >> gabba is an herb that actually calms down. >> what do you do in the instant? >> you can get the control, make sure that they're breathing and if you are not in control, then you call 911. whenever it is so severe you have to make sure and get them -- >> can you grab somebody. >> first thing is make sure it is not a thyroid problem or with adrenals. if you get a psychological patient, try things like breathing exercises, what triggers are that are causing the panic.

you want diversionary activities and avoidance of triggers. >> calm down. >> doctors, thank you. >> thanks for watching. half-a-dozen suspected terrorists are free men today. the u.s. releasing the gitmo detainees to uruguay. 20 states suing president obama over his executive actions on immigration. governor scott walker will join me live and tell us why wisconsin is now all-in. together for the whom days. an organization dedicated to making sure no wounded soldier spends christmas alone. you'll hear from a wounded warrior and how luke's wings gave immuch more than just a plane ticket. america's news headquarters live from the nation's capital starts right now. we begin with this fox news