A few years ago, a client wrote to tell me that her teenage son had just been diagnosed with eosinophilic esophagitis and was wondering if there were any nutritional treatments for it.
Last autumn, a childhood friend emailed me telling me he had been diagnosed with the same condition.
And then few weeks ago, I learned that an out-of-town male relative had also been diagnosed with it.
What is eosinophilic esophagitis? Is it just a coincidence that three people in my sphere have been diagnosed with it in just a few years, or is its prevalence increasing?
What Is Eosinophilic Esophagitis?
In the early 1990s, doctors began describing a new condition called eosinophilic esophagitis (known as EoE) affecting the esophagus, the muscular tube that leads from the mouth to the stomach that is often called “the food pipe.” EoE is a chronic immune system disease in which eosinophils, a type of white blood cell, build up in the esophagus, causing inflammation and injury to the esophagus as a reaction primarily to foods but sometimes to airborne allergens or acid reflux….