Nutritional habits in functional dyspepsia and its subgroups: a comparative study.

OBJECTIVE: Research data demonstrating nutritional habits of functional dyspepsia (FD) patients are very limited. This is the first study to evaluate nutritional habits in FD subgroups according to Rome III criteria. Our aim was to evaluate nutritional habits of FD patients and determine the food items that may provoke a dyspepsia symptom. METHODS: A total of 168 adults with FD and 135 healthy control subjects participated in the study. FD subjects were divided into epigastric pain syndrome (EP-FD), postprandial distress syndrome (PS-FD), mixed (MX-FD) subgroups according to Rome Criteria III. Subjects completed a questionnaire that included a short-form food frequency questionnaire. Furthermore, subjects were asked to list the food items that were causing a dyspepsia symptom. RESULTS: Functional dyspepsia subjects had a slightly higher BMI (26.1 ± 4.97 kg/m(2)) than control subjects (24.6 ± 4.08 kg/m(2)). The most common symptom triggering foods among all the FD groups were fried and fatty foods (27.1%), hot spices (26.4%), and carbonated drinks (21.8%). In FD subgroups, carbonated drinks were more likely to cause a symptom in PS-FD group (37.3%) than MX-FD (25.7%) and EP-FD (22.1%) groups. There was no difference in frequency of main meals and snacks among any of the groups. CONCLUSION: Fatty and spicy foods and carbonated drinks were the most common symptom triggering food items in FD group. In subgroups, carbonated drinks and legumes were more likely to cause a symptom in PS-FD. Removing these food items during the course of treatment might help alleviate the symptoms.

Can angiogenesis be a target of treatment for ribavirin associated hemolytic anemia?

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Recently ribavirin has been found to inhibit angiogenesis and a number of angiogenesis inhibitors such as sunitinib and sorafenib have been found to cause acute hemolysis. We aimed to investigate whether there is a relation between hemoglobin, haptoglobin and angiogenesis soluble markers which are modifiable and can help in developing strategies against anemia. METHODS: Fourteen patients chronically infected with hepatitis C virus were treated by pegylated interferon alpha 2a and ribavirin. Serum hemoglobin, haptoglobin and angiogenesis markers of vascular endothelial growth factor and angiopoetin-2 were investigated before and after therapy. RESULTS: We observed a significant decrease in haptoglobin levels at the end of the treatment period. Hemoglobin levels also decreased but insignificantly by treatment. In contrast with the literature, serum levels of angiogenesis factors did not change significantly by pegylated interferon and ribavirin therapy. We found no correlation of angiogenesis soluble markers with either hemoglobin or haptoglobin. CONCLUSION: This is the first study in the literature investigating a link between angiogenesis soluble markers and ribavirin induced anemia in patients with hepatitis C and we could not find any relation. Future research with larger number of patients is needed to find out modifiable factors that will improve the safety of ribavirin therapy.