They say too much gum chewing can cause diarrhea and unintended weight loss among people, regardless of sex and age.
The scientists from Humboldt University in Berlin say gum which contains the sugar substitute sorbitol, when chewed too often, can cause functional bowel complaints and considerable unintended weight loss.
This revelation came about when Dr. Herbert Lochs, professor of internal medicine at Humboldt and his team were investigating two cases of unintended weight loss.
A 21-year-old woman and a 46-year-old man who were both experiencing diffuse abdominal pains and chronic diarrhea and had lost 24.2 pounds in eight months and 48 pounds in less than a year, respectively.
When their dietary habits were examined it was found that both were consuming excessive amounts of sorbitol, mainly from chewing as many as 14 sticks of gum each day.
Lochs, a gastroenterologist and lead author of the study says that when both patients were put on a diet devoid of sorbitol, they gained weight and their diarrhea disappeared.
The researchers warn that sorbitol is also a laxative which may lead to chronic diarrhea and "potentially dangerous weight loss."
They say any investigation of unexplained weight loss should include detailed dietary history with regard to foods containing sorbitol.
Sorbitol which is also called E420, is a sugar alcohol and a bulk sweetener found in numerous food products particularly diet foods, diet drinks and ice cream and sugar-free chewing gum.
It is 60 percent sweeter than sucrose but contains far less calories.
It is regarded as being safe and has been used in processed foods for decades; it also occurs naturally in pears, prunes and many stone fruits and berries; it is also used in pharmaceuticals and cosmetics.
Medical experts say sorbitol is poorly absorbed by the small intestine, and its excessive intake causes abdominal pain, gas, and mild to severe diarrhea and can also aggravate irritable bowel syndrome.
The study is published in the latest issue of British Medical Journal.
"It has been exciting to see how the SardiNIA and FUSION investigators have productively combined results from a number of populations to lead us to these current insights," noted NIA Director Richard J. Hodes, M.D. "In these efforts, we must also recognize the thousands of study participants for helping to catalyze advances in our understanding of the genetic factors of age-related disease."
NIDDK Director Griffin P. Rodgers, M.D., said, "This study is an example of how an investment in studies originally designed to evaluate specific diseases, such as diabetes, can lead to diverse and unexpected findings."
The research received major support from NHGRI, NIA, NIDDK and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, all of which are part of NIH.
In addition to the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill; University of Michigan, Ann Arbor; NHGRI; and NIA: other institutions with researchers taking part in the study were: the C.N.R Institute of Neurogenetics and Neuropharmacology, Monserrato, Italy; University of Virginia School of Medicine, Charlottesville; University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore; University of Bristol, England; the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, Cambridge, Mass.; Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Baltimore; London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, University of London; Keck School of Medicine, University of Southern California, Los Angeles; Veterans Administration Medical Center, Baltimore; University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston; and the University of Helsinki and the National Public Health Institute in Finland.
For the FUSION group, the laboratory analysis of genetic variants was conducted by the Center for Inherited Disease Research, using funding from NIH and The Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. For the SardiNIA group, the analysis was conducted by the ProgeNIA team of the genetic laboratory in Lanusei, Sardinia. The analysis of the Diabetes Genetics Initiative (DGI) follow-up samples was primarily supported by funding from the Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research, Basel, Switzerland.
Also today, another NIH-supported genome-wide association study involving the FUSION, SardiNIA and DGI groups was released in the advance online publication of Nature Genetics. In that work, an international team, which included many researchers from the height study, identified seven new genetic variants associated with levels of cholesterol and other fats in the blood and confirmed 11 others.
For more information about genome-wide association studies, go to genome/20019523. For more information about osteoarthritis, go to: health.nih/result.asp/485/27.
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) - The Nation's Medical Research Agency - includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. It is the primary federal agency for conducting and supporting basic, clinical and translational medical research, and it investigates the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases.
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