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Zero Fiber is Best for Constipation
🕑 Added 2018-08-19 14:35:03 +0000 UTC This is an email I just shared with my family so I thought I'd share it with y'all too. (Thanks to An who earlier commented on one of my posts with a link to this talk)Dr. Paul Mason - 'From fibre to the microbiome: low carb gut health'
"By the end [of this talk] I hope to have convinced you of a few things: Firstly, that fiber is *not* a necessity for a healthy diet." (Followed by murmurs, gasps and laughter from the crowd)
"...When we have a look at the current governmental advice, they consider that fiber is the best available treatment for constipation bar none. But, this opinion doesn't bear scientific scrutiny. Now, for such a wide and believed claim, you'd think there would be compelling evidence to back it up. Except there's not. I could not locate one randomized control trial expressly looking at symptoms of constipation. Sure there's trials looking at bulk and transit rate and things like that, but when we look at the symptoms of constipation, the research just isn't there. So I'd like to present to you the best trial I could find."
The study he references is this: "Stopping or Reducing Dietary Fiber Intake reduces Constipation and its associated Symptoms"
He explains that the study looks at 63 people with constipation related symptoms, and that people were on either a baseline diet, a high fiber diet, a reduced fiber diet and a zero fiber diet that "required the complete cessation of all vegetables, cereals, fruits, wholemeal breads and rice."
As you can see from the graphs, the high fiber diet actually worsened constipation related symptoms whereas the reduced fiber diet provided a modest reduction in symptoms.
But what about the zero fiber diet?
After he changes to this slide he says "This is not a mistake. I didn't just forget to put something in the slide there.
...Now, not one patient on the zero fiber diet and any symptoms and these findings were highly statistically significant.
...Now just out of interest, every single person in the zero fiber group ended up having one bowel action per day every day. How did this compare to those on the high fiber group? One bowel action on average every 6.83 days. Still think that fiber's good for constipation?"
・All this is explained in the first 5 minutes of the talk, but the rest of it is very worthwhile and explains why fiber isn't a magical bowel hero
Dr. Paul Mason - 'From fibre to the microbiome: low carb gut health'
Comments
Thank you so much for this info. What role do you think the gall bladder plays in constipation? Just seems like bile whose role is to emulsify, would help with “regular” bms.
Craig Talbert
It was crazy to see Michael Greger post this today. Fiber is a new wedge issue in the diet wars. <a href="https://nutritionfacts.org/2018/08/23/how-to-activate-appetite-suppressing-hormones/" rel="nofollow noopener" target="_blank">https://nutritionfacts.org/2018/08/23/how-to-activate-appetite-suppressing-hormones/</a>
