Gastroenterologist in Sharjah

What a gastroenterologist treats

Gastroenterology covers the entire digestive tract — oesophagus, stomach, small and large intestine, rectum — along with the liver, gallbladder and pancreas.

Digestive symptoms are among the most common reasons anyone sees a doctor, and among the most commonly self-treated for years before they do. Indigestion becomes a daily antacid habit. Bloating becomes something you eat around. The reason to get assessed is that most digestive conditions are treatable, several are entirely curable, and a small number are serious enough that finding them early changes everything.

When should you see a gastroenterologist?

• Heartburn or acid reflux more than twice a week, or needing regular antacids
• Persistent abdominal pain, bloating or discomfort
• A change in bowel habit lasting more than a few weeks
• Diarrhoea or constipation that does not settle
• Difficulty or pain swallowing
• Persistent nausea or vomiting
• Unexplained weight loss
• Yellowing of the eyes or skin
• An abnormal liver blood test
• A fatty liver reported on ultrasound
• Rectal bleeding or blood in the stool
• A family history of bowel cancer
• Iron deficiency anaemia with no obvious cause

Three symptoms should never wait: blood in the stool, unexplained weight loss, and difficulty swallowing that is getting worse. Each is usually caused by something benign. Each is also how the serious conditions first present, and each is routinely explained away for months.

When is it an emergency?

Go to the emergency department for:

• Vomiting blood, or vomit that looks like coffee grounds
• Black, tarry stools
• Severe abdominal pain of sudden onset
• Abdominal pain with fever and vomiting
• Inability to keep any fluids down
• Severe rectal bleeding

Acid reflux and GERD

Reflux is acid moving up from the stomach into the oesophagus. Occasional heartburn is normal. Reflux more than twice a week is GERD, and it is a condition rather than an inconvenience.

Untreated, long-standing reflux can inflame and eventually change the lining of the oesophagus. It also causes symptoms people rarely connect to it — chronic cough, hoarseness, a persistent lump sensation in the throat, disturbed sleep and dental erosion.

Treatment works: acid-suppressing medication, alongside changes that genuinely matter — eating earlier before bed, smaller evening meals, weight reduction, and raising the head of the bed. Where medication does not control it, or where symptoms have been present for years, endoscopy is used to look directly.

If you have been taking antacids or acid-suppressing medication daily for months, that is a reason to be assessed, not a reason to continue.

Stomach ulcers and H. pylori

Helicobacter pylori is a bacterium that infects the stomach lining. It is the most common cause of stomach and duodenal ulcers, and prevalence in this region is high.

It is also curable. A course of treatment eradicates the infection in most people and heals the ulcer, and eradication reduces long-term stomach cancer risk. Testing is straightforward — a breath test, stool test or biopsy taken at endoscopy.

Persistent indigestion is worth testing for, rather than managing indefinitely with medication that treats the acid while leaving the cause in place.

Endoscopy and colonoscopy

Gastroscopy examines the oesophagus, stomach and upper small intestine with a thin flexible camera. It takes around ten minutes, is performed with sedation or throat spray, and allows biopsies to be taken.

Colonoscopy examines the large bowel. Preparation — the bowel cleansing the day before — is the part patients dislike, and it is also the part that determines whether the test is worth doing. An incompletely prepared bowel means polyps get missed.

Colonoscopy is both diagnostic and therapeutic: polyps found during the procedure are usually removed at the same time. Since most bowel cancers develop from polyps over years, removing one is genuinely preventive rather than merely reassuring.

Capsule endoscopy — a swallowed camera — examines the small intestine, which conventional scopes cannot fully reach.

Bowel cancer screening

Bowel cancer is one of the few common cancers that can be prevented rather than only detected early, because its precursor is a visible, removable polyp.

Screening is recommended from around age 45 to 50 for average risk, and earlier with a family history or inflammatory bowel disease. Options include stool testing and colonoscopy; your gastroenterologist will advise which suits your risk profile.

Screening rates in this region are low relative to the disease burden, and the most common reason people give is that they have no symptoms. Early bowel cancer has no symptoms. That is the entire point of screening.

IBS and functional gut disorders

Irritable bowel syndrome causes abdominal pain, bloating and altered bowel habit without structural damage. It is extremely common and frequently dismissed — by patients and sometimes by doctors — as "nothing wrong."

Something is wrong. IBS is a genuine disorder of gut function and gut–brain signalling, and it can be substantially disabling. Diagnosis involves excluding conditions that mimic it — coeliac disease, inflammatory bowel disease, infection — and then treating it properly, through dietary approaches, targeted medication, and addressing the stress and sleep factors that reliably worsen it.

Being told your tests are normal is the beginning of IBS treatment, not the end of the consultation.

Inflammatory bowel disease

Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis are chronic inflammatory conditions, distinct from IBS. They cause ongoing inflammation, and they need long-term specialist management with monitoring and medication adjustment over years.

Warning signs that point to IBD rather than IBS include blood in the stool, waking at night with diarrhoea, fever, unexplained weight loss, and raised inflammatory markers.

Liver conditions

Fatty liver disease is now the most common liver condition in the UAE, driven by the same factors as diabetes and obesity — and it frequently coexists with both.

Most cases are found incidentally on an ultrasound done for another reason. Many people are told they have a fatty liver and hear it as unimportant. In most cases it will not progress; in a meaningful minority it causes inflammation, then scarring, then cirrhosis. The difference is largely determined by weight, blood sugar control and alcohol.

There is no medication that reverses fatty liver. Weight reduction does — and a loss of around 7 to 10 per cent of body weight produces measurable improvement in liver inflammation. That is one of the clearest cause-and-effect relationships in medicine, and it is worth acting on early.

Hepatitis B and C are treatable, and hepatitis C is curable in the great majority of cases with modern therapy. Both are common enough regionally and often silent for years. Testing is a simple blood test.

Abnormal liver blood tests are a frequent reason for referral and have many causes — fatty liver, medication, viral hepatitis, autoimmune conditions, alcohol. Assessment identifies which.

Pancreatic and gallbladder conditions

Pancreatitis, pancreatic cysts, and the digestive consequences of gallstones. ERCP is a specialised endoscopic procedure used to treat blockages in the bile and pancreatic ducts. Gallbladder surgery is performed by General and Laparoscopic Surgery.

What happens at your appointment

A detailed history — symptoms, timing, relationship to food, bowel pattern, weight change, medications, family history — then examination.

Blood tests including liver function, coeliac screening and inflammatory markers are common. Stool tests where relevant. Ultrasound for liver and gallbladder. Endoscopy or colonoscopy where direct examination is needed.

You leave with a diagnosis or a clear plan for reaching one, and specific advice on what should bring you back sooner.

Cost and insurance

Most UAE plans cover gastroenterology consultation and standard blood tests. Endoscopy and colonoscopy usually require pre-approval, and screening colonoscopy in the absence of symptoms is sometimes excluded even where diagnostic colonoscopy is covered. Confirm on 06 599 7777 before booking.