ABSTRACT
Gastro-esophageal reflux (GER) is recognized to occur in the majority, if not all neonates. In most of these children, GER will disappear spontaneously and will cause no significant clinical problems. A minority however, will run a less benign course and will develop serious pathological complications of their reflux, which will require treatment.1-3 Diagnostically, there are difficulties in identifying those children who are most at risk.2-5 On the one hand, this is often caused by a lack of specificity and sensitivity of the tests which are employed; on the other, it may be difficult to be sure that GER is the cause of the clinical complex from which the child is suffering. Treatment may therefore be inappropriate either because pathological reflux has been missed or because the child’s problems are unrelated to GER.
