Nausea is the feeling of unease and discomfort in the stomach with an urge to vomit. For something so common, it is deceptively complicated. Modern treatments for nausea have been some of the pharmaceutical industry's greatest successes and have eased the distress of millions of patients undergoing surgery or cancer therapies.
Disease: Nausea
Last update: May 2005
Intro
FAQ
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What is it?
Nausea is a feeling of unease and discomfort in the stomach, accompanied by the urge to vomit.
Vomiting is a complex reflex reaction, which is influenced by signals from the mouth, stomach, gut, circulation, inner ear and brain. It can be triggered by a large number of stimuli including motion, pregnancy, drug treatment, allergies, alcohol and infections.
In general, short-term nausea and vomiting are harmless but prolonged and persistent symptoms can indicate a more serious disease, like cancer. -
Who gets it?
Everybody experiences nausea and vomiting at some point during their lifetime, often in childhood as the result of an infection.
Many patients experience nausea and vomiting after surgery. It is also a common side effect of chemotherapy, affecting about seventy per cent of patients. -
What can be done about it?
There are various treatments available for the prevention of motion sickness, which decrease the signals from the inner ear to the vomiting centre in the brain.
Great advances have recently been made in the treatment of chemotherapy-induced nausea and vomiting with the introduction of medicines which block signals from the small intestine to the brain. -
What does the future hold?
Medicines used for the treatment of other conditions are currently under investigation for the treatment of nausea. Studies into the use of cannabis derivates in chemotherapy are also under way.
Despite the many advances in this field there is still no cure for nausea. It is now thought that therapy with different combinations of medicines could be the answer to controlling this particularly complex reflex.