Below is a list of IBS foods we recommend you avoid to reduce IBS symptoms. They are commonly known as "trigger foods".
"IBS" is the shortened description of Irritable Bowel Syndrome.
Although it is recognised as a term used to describe a common discomfort of the gut and bowels, in short, Irritable Bowel syndrome can not be explained away in a few simple words. The answer is a lot bigger than the question!
- Alcohol is a gastrointestinal irritant and often triggers IBS
attacks, especially on an empty stomach. Small amounts of alcohol in
cooking are fine
- Artificial fats, such as Olestra, can cause abdominal cramping and diarrhea in people who don’t even have IBS
- Artificial sweeteners, such as sorbitol, can trigger pain, cramps, gas, bloating, and diarrhea
- Battered and deep-fried food
- Biscuits
- Caffeine is a gastrointestinal stimulant and should be avoided, especially in higher doses
- Carbonation in soda pop and mineral water can cause bloating and cramps
- Coffee: regular and decaf coffee contain an enzyme that is a powerful irritant of the gastrointestinal tract
- Croissants, pastries, biscuits, scones, and doughnuts
- Dairy products such as cheese, butter, sour cream, cream cheese, milk, cream, ice cream, whipped cream, yogurt, frozen yogurt
- Dried bananas – they are often deep fried in oil
- Egg yolks (whites are fine, do try to buy organic)
- Mashed potatoes which have butter / milk
- MSG used a lot in Chinese food. MSG has been implicated as a cause or trigger of various digestive issues
- Potato chips – unless they are baked
- Poultry dark meat and skin. Skinless chicken white meat is fine
- Red meat, such as ground beef, hamburgers, hot dogs, steaks, roast
beef, pastrami, salami, bologna, pepperoni, corned beef, ham, bacon,
sausage, pork chops, and any other meat that comes from cows, pigs,
sheep, goats, deer, etc
- Skillet-fried food that is cooked in fat or oil
- Solid carob – but carob powder is OK
- Solid chocolate – but baking cocoa powder is OK
- Wheat, rye, barley or other foods containing gluten
Read more:
Definition of Irritable bowel syndrome
Irritable bowel syndrome represents a functional disease, characterized by transit disorders, generally constipation alternating with diarrhea, diffuse abdominal pain, sometimes mucus emission.
Clinical features
- diffuse abdominal pain, or located along the colon. They may be smothered, but often have a cramp character, duration of seconds to minutes. Other times the patient feels only an abdominal discomfort. The most often symptoms disappear in the relaxing periods, holiday etc.
- transit disorders are frequent, characteristic being the alternation constipation-diarrhea. The stool emission is often hard, fragmented, covered with mucus.
- mucus emission accompanies the hard stool. Blood does not appear in stool in the irritable bowel syndrome, but the hard, rough stools may create anal fissures that may bleed.
- bloading
Diagnosis
Manning criteria:
- abdominal pain that disappear after stool emission
- stool becoming more frequent and soft in the presence of pain
- bloating, flatulence
- sensation of incomplete evacuation of the rectum
- elimination of mucus in stools
- imperious character of defecation
Clinical data of the irritable bowel syndrome diagnosis
- elevated ESR
- leukocytosis
- pus, blood or fat in the stools
- more than 200g of stool per day
- persistent diarrhea
- hipokaliemia
- no spastic response to rectal distension during manometry
Paraclinic diagnosis
- anoscopy, rectoscopy, colonoscopy (sometimes barium enema), to evidence the organic pathology of colon;
- gastroscopy, to show the possible gastric lesions;
- abdominal and pelvic ultrasonography, to show the gallbladder, pancreas and genital organs;
- radiologic evaluation of intestine (enteroclysis or barium examination) or enteroscopy for small bowel pathology.
Differential diagnosis
- ano-rectal and colon neoplasm
- inflammatory bowel disease(ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease)
- colonic diverticulosis and diverticulitis
- lactase deficit
- functional dyspepsia
Evolution
The irritable colon evolution is favorable, since there are no complications.
In general, the disease evolves for a long time, with periods of silence or with exacerbations, usually related to stress.
Treatment of irritable colon
1. Diet. When the constipation predominates, the diet will be rich in alimentary fibers. If the diet is not sufficient, constipation will be controlled with laxatives type Forlax (that increase the stool volume). The patients should avoid consuming certain food that induces symptoms.
2. Medication. The therapy consists in:
- antidiarrheic drugs - Smecta(smectitis) or Imodium(loperamid)
- antispastic - Spasmomen
-Debridat
-Dicetel
-No-Spa
-the medication is given only when needed
- sedatives - Hidroxizin
-Rudotel
