Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is known to cause painful conditions that lead to the patient experiencing diarrhea and fatigue. Treatment often involves medication and surgery, but now, a new study suggests that just by eating strawberries could help cure colonic inflammation and also improve gut health.
The research team presented their work recently at the 256th National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society (ACS). “The sedentary lifestyle and dietary habits of many people in this country — high-sugar, high-animal-fat, but low-fiber diets — may promote colonic inflammation and increase the risk of IBD,” said Hang Xiao, who led the study.
In the year 2015, nearly 3 million U.S. adults were reported to have been diagnosed with IBD, according to the data collected by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. IBD also includes Crohn’s disease as well as ulcerative colitis. People who suffer from IBD are also at a higher risk of developing colorectal cancer.
It has been shown that consuming fruits and vegetables can significantly lower the risk of IBD. Xiao and his team at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, focused their attention on strawberries because of their wide consumption to see how fruit consumption can decrease colonic inflammation in IBD patients as well as in the general population.
According to Yanhui Han, a postdoctoral student who conducted the study, many of the previous reports focused on the effects of purified compounds and extracts from strawberries. “But when you only test the purified compounds and extracts, you miss out on a lot of other important components in the berries, such as dietary fiber, as well as phenolic compounds bound to the fibers, that can’t be extracted by solvents,” he said. Han also added that it is quite useful- studying the effects of whole berries- since people also tend to consume whole fruits rather than their extracts.
For the study, Han and Xiao worked with four groups of mice- one of these groups consisting of healthy mice consuming a regular diet, and three groups of mice suffering from IBD, consuming a diet made up of 2.5 percent whole strawberry powder or a diet with 5 percent whole strawberry powder.
Results showed that consuming whole strawberries at a dose equivalent to that of human consumption suppressed diarrhea symptoms like body weight loss and bloody stools in mice with IBD. Consuming strawberries also reduced inflammation in the colonic tissues of mice.
The next step in the reserach process would be to validate the findings in IBD patients. Though eating three-quarters of strawberries a day could prove be extremely helpful for people hoping to improve their gut health, but Xiao notes that patients should consult their doctors before making this change in their diets.