Ultra-Processed Foods May Increase the Risk of Inflammatory Bowel Disease

• Researchers say a regular diet that includes ultra-processed foods increases your risk of developing inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).
• They say foods such as red meat and salty snacks themselves don’t necessarily increase the risk. Rather, it’s the way the foods are processed.
• Experts say you can reduce the amount of ultra-processed foods in your diet by purchasing products with fewer ingredients and by preparing these foods in your kitchen where you don’t use as many additives or preservatives.

Eating ultra-processed foods heightens your risk of developing inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).

That’s the core finding from the Prospective Urban Rural Epidemiology (PURE) study published this week in The BMJ.

An international team of researchers drew on detailed dietary information from 116,087 adults ages 35 to 70 living in 21 low, middle, and high income countries.

The study took place from 2003 and 2016 with self-reported assessments being completed at least every 3 years.

Over an average follow-up of nearly 10 years, 467 participants developed IBD (377 with ulcerative colitis and 90 with Crohn’s disease).

Other significant findings:

• an 82 percent increased risk of IBD with five or more servings of ultra-processed food per day
• a 67 percent increased risk of IBD with one to four servings of ultra-processed food per day

The results were consistent for Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. However, as the researchers noted, results relied on self-reported diagnoses and didn’t account for dietary changes over time.

Foods associated with digestive problems include:

• soft drinks
• refined sweetened foods
• salty snacks
• processed meat

The symptoms associated with IBD include:

• persistent diarrhea
• abdominal pain
• rectal bleeding or bloody stools
• weight loss
• fatigue

White and red meat, dairy, starch, fruit, vegetables, and legumes (such as peas, beans, and lentils) were not directly associated with an increased risk of IBD.

Therefore, researchers said, it might not be the food itself that increases this risk but rather the way the food is processed.