Everywhere I look, I am reading and hearing about inflammation, and the havoc it can cause. Inflammation really is at the root cause of most of our modern-day chronic health conditions, from diabetes to heart disease, Auto-Immune disease, osteoporosis, and dementia.
It is interesting, because inflammation is not entirely bad; in fact it is a normal and healthy response to an injury or an acute challenge to the body. It is the inflammatory response that allows the body to deal with the pathogen of injury and contain it to then allow healing to occur.
The problem develops when we cannot, for a variety of reasons, turn off the inflammatory response, and the inflammation becomes chronic. In which case, healing doesn’t occur and we suffer the consequences of chronic inflammation.
One of the sources of inflammation can be our gut, and the foods we eat can contribute to that inflammation. It is not unusual for even seemingly “healthy” foods to cause inflammation in people. The challenge can be in figuring out what foods might be contributing factors. Doing an elimination diet is known to be the gold standard, but it can be quite challenging to do.
In our practice, we use food intolerance testing quite often to help identify potential sources of inflammation. This type of testing can identify foods to which a given individual is reacting. The food is then removed for a period of time while the inflamed gut heals.
James White on the recent KBMO Diagnostics IRB Approved IBS Clinical Trial
In this era when evidenced based medicine is all the buzz KBMO Diagnostics who provide the FIT test have recently completed a clinical study looking at how the FIT test impacts patients with IBS (Irritable Bowel Syndrome).
It has been estimated that approximately 18% of people in North America have irritable bowel syndrome (IBS).1 Despite the wide-ranging physical manifestations of this disorder, which include cramping, abdominal pain, constipation, bloating, and diarrhea, IBS receives little attention compared with less prevalent conditions, perhaps because of the nature of the symptoms of IBS and/or because most people with IBS do not seek medical attention.2 It is also estimated that among patients with IBS, approximately 25% seek medical care for their symptoms, and only 5% are seen in the tertiary care setting. However, although it appears that the percentage of patients seeking medical care for IBS symptoms represents a small percentage of those with IBS, the high prevalence of the disorder results in sizable direct costs for physician visits , ER visits , diagnostic tests and pharmacologic treatments.
KBMO ran an independent IRB approved clinical study on 100 patients with the following improvements in the intervention group:
· Statistically and clinically significant reduction in their IBS Symptom Severity Score
· Significant reduction in both HS CRP and Homocysteine, both Cardiovascular risk markers
· 50% Reduction in Primary Care visits
We have all been hearing about the importance of a healthy gut and gut microbiome in our overall health, and it is exciting to know that we have yet another way to assess our gut health and to help restore balance when the system has gotten hijacked by an ongoing cycle of inflammation. We are happy to discuss whether food intolerance testing would be a helpful component to your overall health.