A Review of Esophageal pH Monitoring for the Diagnosis of Gastroesophageal Reflux in Children

Received January 5, 2000 Abstract Gastroesophageal reflux (GER) is a common disease found in early childhood. It commonly presents with vomiting and feeding problems. However, it may involve other systems like respiratory system, growth failure. Twenty-four hours esophageal pH monitoring is a useful technique in diagnosis of gastroesophageal reflux. Results of 24 hours esophageal pH monitoring should be correlated with clinical features before and during the procedure. As the conventional esophageal pH monitoring only detects reflux into the distal esophagus, reflux that reach beyond upper esophageal sphincter would not be detected. This so-called extra-esophageal reflux could cause a myriad of upper and lower airway symptoms. To address this problem, a special technique called dual probe esophageal pH monitoring of both distal esophagus and hypopharynx was reported to be useful.