In recent years it appears there is a rising epidemic of population suffering from continuing digestive and autoimmune conditions. Food intolerance or sensitivities may lie at the root of the problem. Most people, including doctors, have exiguous clue how foods they eat may be contributing to their continuing illness, fatigue and digestive symptoms.
There are, however, a lot of clues in the medical literature and the lay public's sense about how foods are causing and/or contributing to the current epidemic of continuing illness and autoimmune disease. There are several diets being used by many population with varying success to improve their condition despite a general lack of iron clad scientific proof for their effectiveness. One of the clues to the cause and relief of food induced illness may lie in proteins known as lectins that are gift in all foods.
Animal and plant sources of food both comprise complicated proteins known as lectins. These proteins typically have the ability to attach to sugars or carbohydrates on the covering of human cells. Some of these proteins can cause clumping of human red blood cells, a process that is called agglutination. The process of agglutination occurs when person receives the wrong blood type while a blood transfusion. In fact, red blood cell agglutination definite to each person or groups of population is the basis for testing for blood types. There is some data that blood types may affect how population answer to unavoidable foods though a blood type definite diet appears to have been disproven. The attachment or binding of unavoidable food lectins can begin a collection of cell definite effects. These reactions may mimic hormones or cause changes in cells. This is termed molecular mimicry.
Most plants comprise lectins, some of which are toxic, inflammatory, or both. Many of these plant and dairy lectin are defiant to cooking and digestive enzymes. Grain lectins, for example, are quite defiant to human digestion but well grand for ruminants like cattle who have multi-chambered stomachs. Therefore, lectins are gift in our food and are often defiant to our digestion and some have been scientifically shown to have necessary Gi toxicity in humans. Others have been shown to be useful and maybe even cancer protecting. Either way plant and animal proteins are foreign proteins to the body and are dealt with by digestion and our immune system in a unavoidable or negative manner.
The human digestive system was created to handle a collection of plant and animal proteins straight through the process of digestion and elimination. Some plant and animal proteins or lectins are severely toxic to humans and cannot be eaten without causing death like those in Castor beans and some mushrooms. Other foods must be ready before they are safe to be eaten. Preparations may comprise pealing, prolonged soaking and cooking like kidney beans. Other foods may be poorly tolerated because of a genetic predisposition or basal pre-existing food allergy or intolerance. Others are tolerated to some degree or quantity but not in large amounts or on a frequent basis. population who are intolerant to the milk sugar lactose, because of inherited or acquired scantness in lactase enzyme, may tolerate small amounts but may have severe bloating, gas, abdominal pain and cramps with explosive diarrhea when a large number of lactose containing foods are eaten. Foods can become intolerable to some population after their immune system changes or gut is injured from someone else cause.
Of the food lectins, grain/cereal lectins; dairy lectins; and legume lectins (especially peanut lectin and soybean lectin) are the most base ones associated with reports of aggravation of inflammatory and digestive diseases in the body and improvement of those diseases and/or symptoms when avoided. recent research by Loren Cordain PhD., has recommend that these lectins may effectively serve as a "Trojan horse" allowing intact or nearly intact foreign proteins to invade our natural gut defenses and enter behind the lines to cause damage well beyond the gut, ordinarily in joints, brain, and skin of affected individuals. Once damage occurs to the gut and the defense system is breached the effect is what some refer to as a "leaky gut". Moreover, many population who institute a "leaky gut" not only have gut symptoms such as bloating, gas, diarrhea, and abdominal pain but also other symptoms beyond the gut, or extra-intestinal symptoms. ordinarily affected areas are the brain or peripheral nerves, skin, joints, and discrete body glands. With prolonged exposure of the gut by these toxic food lectins a persistent stimulation of the body's defense mechanism in a dysfunctional manner, occurs, i.e. Autoimmune disease.
Wrong types or levels of good and bad bacteria in the gut, or intestinal dysbiosis, may contribute to this process of abnormal stimulation of the immune system. research supports the strong possibility that such stimulation may be accentuated by interaction of the bacteria with food lectins. It is believed by some that this may supplementary worsen gut injury and autoimmune disease. This latter idea is gaining acceptance and recognition by doctors in one form as the hygiene theory. It is speculated that our gut bacteria have become altered by increased hygiene and over use of antibiotics and that this phenomenon may be playing a necessary role in the rising incidence of autoimmune diseases such as diabetes, arthritis, and continuing intestinal diseases like Crohn's disease and irritable bowel syndrome.
Lectins as a cause however are largely being ignored in the U.S. Though the field of lectinology and lectins role in disease is more standard internationally. Avoidance of unavoidable food lectins may be helpful in achieving condition and medical of continuing gut injury. medical of a "leaky gut" and avoidance of ongoing abnormal stimulation of the immune system by toxic food lectins and bacteria in the gut is the basis for ongoing research and probable success of several beloved diets such as the paleo diet, carbohydrate definite diet and gluten-free/casein-free diet. More research is needed in this animated but often neglected area. The Food Doc, Llc features a website http://www.thefooddoc.com that will provide doctor authored information on food intolerance, sensitivity and allergy such as lectin, gluten, casein, and lactose intolerance with dietary advice that will feature in the near time to come an online symptom estimation and diet-diary.
Copyright 2006, The Food Doc, Llc. All rights reserved. http://www.thefooddoc.com
Food Lectins in condition and Disease: An Introduction
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