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fiber intake

The Benefits of a Low Fiber Diet for Colitis

by author on November 30, 2009

Colitis is a condition involving inflammation in the colon. As you would expect, making changes to your diet can have a direct impact on colitis. While the normal treatment and prevention of colon disorders is to eat a diet high in a variety of types of fiber, under the care of your doctor, you may want to go on a low fiber diet for colitis.

More specifically, you may want to limit your insoluble fiber intake. Soluble fiber may still be beneficial for your colon health. This may work best with the medications your doctors prescribe. Basically, you don’t want big, hard, roughly formed objects passing through your colon when it is inflamed. Such could obviously be quite painful.

Colitis is often a part of a chronic condition, so you’ll really need to make all-around changes to your lifestyle in order to effectively treat it. It is known that those who eat diets very low in fiber content are most prone to developing such a condition. Some other foods, such as excessively acidic foods or those with condensed simple sugars may also cause problems. Drugs such as caffeine, alcohol, prescription, and illicit are all associated with a higher risk. There may also be emotional factors involved. Some people can even get it from immune dysfunction, such as food allergies.

The idea behind including a low insoluble fiber diet in your treatment regimen is to make everything pass through easily, without too much agitation. Drinking plenty of water each day may also be an important part of this. The water may also provide some healing properties. It all depends on what types of medications the doctor has you taking. You want to make things as easy as possible for your digestive tract in order to avoid further agitation. Since most intestinal problems appear to be associated with eating low fiber diets as a part of an unhealthy lifestyle, you’ll definitely want to discuss how you can develop a lifestyle to benefit your colon for now, as well as for the rest of your life with your doctor.

While colitis can be a difficult and debilitating problem, there are plenty of changes you can make to improve the situation. So you shouldn’t get too discouraged about it. Some people find that making permanent lifestyle changes provides permanent removal of the problem, while many find that it makes coping with the problem a small matter. You will receive many other health benefits from improving your lifestyle that will add to your vitality and make the whole process worthwhile.


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Eating a High Fiber Diet

by author on November 2, 2009

There are many different benefits from eating a high fiber diet according to the research that has been done in the world of health and nutrition.

High fiber diets can help to lower high cholesterol, although not all types of fiber seem to have this effect.  Rolled oats seem to provide the best effects, so that eating whole grain oatmeal can be of benefit to those with high cholesterol, since this type of fiber seems to help the cholesterol pass from the body.

Since eating a high fiber diet helps with bowel problems, it helps to keep the colon cleaner which has been found to be helpful in preventing colon cancer.  In addition, although not agreed upon by all research, eating a high fiber diet has also been found to be helpful in weight loss since most of these foods require more chewing and do not allow individuals to intake many calories at a time.  In addition, they are low in calories so that when a person eats them they feel full but have not taken in as many calories as other foods.

Children do not need as much fiber until they reach about nine years old, needing only between nineteen to twenty-five grams per day to have a high fiber diet.

After that point it depends whether the person is a male or female to determine the amount of fiber needed in his or her diet, and what age they are.

For males, the highest need for fiber intake is between fourteen and fifty years of age when they need about thirty-eight grams of fiber per day to have a high fiber diet.

For females who are not pregnant or lactating, the highest years for fiber intake are between nine and eighteen with about twenty-six grams of fiber needed per day.  When women are pregnant or lactating, they need about twenty-eight to twenty-nine grams of fiber per day to have a high fiber diet.


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