If you suddenly lose your appetite, feel disgusted by food, feel nauseous at the sight of greasy dishes, experience fatigue, have sore calves, notice red urine, or have yellowing eyes, you may be suffering from hepatitis.
Food is the primary source of energy for the human body. After a few hours without eating, the body will feel hunger, and at that point, consuming a small amount of food can satisfy the body’s needs. However, when the body is ill, the sensation of appetite can be affected.
From the quality of eating habits, preferences or aversions to certain foods, irregular food intake, changes in taste, and unusual feelings after meals, we can assess whether the body is unwell.
Loss of Appetite
This condition can arise from two possibilities. Loss of appetite can be physiological if there are no other unusual symptoms, primarily influenced by strong emotional changes such as sadness or excessive fear affecting the central nervous system’s regulation of eating.
Pathological causes of loss of appetite:
– Sudden loss of desire to eat, a bland taste in the mouth, nasal congestion, a runny nose, a white-coated tongue, often caused by the flu.
– Frequent loss of appetite, loose stools, increased frequency, and feeling nauseous at the smell of food, particularly fatty foods, indicating reduced stomach and intestinal function.
– A bland mouth, poor eating habits, often indicating habitual constipation. This occurs because during constipation, harmful bacteria in the intestines die and produce toxic substances, affecting liver function and the vegetative center.
Additionally, loss of appetite can also be caused by acute infectious diseases, kidney disease, heart disease, or malignancies. In some cases, loss of appetite in the elderly and children often serves as a warning sign or precursor to a serious illness, needing close observation.
Excessive Appetite
This condition can be physiological, resulting from pregnancy, heavy physical work, or high energy expenditure, leading the body to compensate by eating more.
Common pathological manifestations of excessive appetite include eating a lot but still losing weight due to conditions like hyperthyroidism or diabetes. Moreover, severe hardening of the cerebral blood vessels can lead to oxygen deficiency in the central brain (the area regulating food absorption), resulting in excessive appetite.
Unusual Sensations After Eating
Normal appetite can change after consuming fatty foods, leading to pain and bloating in the upper right abdomen that radiates to the right shoulder: this may indicate gallbladder or bile duct issues.
30-60 minutes after eating, if discomfort is felt in the upper abdomen (epigastric area) after consuming a small amount of food like a few biscuits, bread, or cake, accompanied by drinking a little hot water alleviating symptoms, this may indicate chronic gastritis or duodenal ulcers.
Feeling full after eating, experiencing nausea, belching, stomach pain, occasional constipation or diarrhea, and noticeable weight loss can indicate gastric prolapse.
After overeating, if you suddenly experience severe abdominal pain in the upper region, or cramping radiating to the left side of the back, along with rumbling, nausea, vomiting, or fever, this could be a symptom of acute pancreatitis.
Experiencing abdominal pain and diarrhea after consuming cold food indicates excessive sensitivity to cold food and a dysfunction of the stomach and intestines.
Normal eating followed by excessive gastric motility, audible bowel sounds, and the urge to defecate suggests a disruption in gastric and intestinal function, indicating either overly sensitive intestines or chronic intestinal inflammation.
Consider early-stage stomach cancer if, after eating, food regurgitates into the mouth and is accompanied by difficulty swallowing, where only liquids or soft foods can be consumed, along with discomfort in the sternum and upper abdomen, poor nutrition, and noticeable weight loss due to esophageal cancer or pyloric spasms. Elderly and middle-aged individuals experiencing upper abdominal bloating without any other cause and significant weight loss should seek specialist medical advice for examination.
