I'd be interested in how this works out. My wife has trouble with food getting stuck in her esophagus. She usually has to go in and have it "stretched" about once a year.
I had that done once when I was in my mid 20's. I never realized what was going on as a younger man - never knew I had acid reflux but my esophagus was so tight, I'd choke easily on food. Tuna fish sandwiches were the worst - they'd just turn into concrete. Had to have a piece of steak fished out of my throat after spending the night in the E.R. trying to throw it up or swallow it.
Had the stretch procedure and it didn't really help - again - no one really talked to me about diet or whatever. Then a few years later I'm traveling on the road and I eat an apple slice - felt like it went down sideways and I'm not sure what it did but I was in horrible pain every time I swallowed. Couldn't eat and didn't want to drink water. This went on for about 6 days where I was forcing myself to drink water just to stay hydrated.
But after the pain stopped and whatever happened healed, I could swallow without issue.
fast forward to 5 years ago, I had been living on tums for the past decade. I had to stop eating pizza, spaghetti and bar-b-q.
The doctor put me on Prilosec and that was a blessing. I could eat anything I wanted. Then I read about the side effects of daily usage of prilosec - that it was never intended to be a daily medicine for most people so I stopped and just went back to be careful what I ate.
Doc had me scoped and read me the riot act. He was concerned I was pre-Barretts as I had lesions on the throat, had me start back up with an increased dosage and go back in 3 months.
Just had the second scope about 3 weeks ago and thankfully everything has healed, but I've altered my diet to where I don't eat acidic inducing foods and I'm back to taking the prilosec every day - and I'll just hope for the best down the road.
Never discussed surgery for me. I've lost some weight recently and that has seemed to help as well.
I've just accepted that at this point in my life whatever has a hole in it, some doctor is going to put a camera in it every 2-5 years.