Drinking White Grape Juice Rather Than Apple Juice Might Alleviate Irritable Bowel Syndrome For Some Young People, According To a Preliminary Study
As many as 10% of school-aged children may have chronic abdominal pain
Concord, MA, September 2, 2003
For some young people, irritable bowel syndrome might be alleviated by simply drinking white grape juice instead of apple juice. According to researchers, poorly absorbed sugars present in juices like apple juice or pear nectar may trigger symptoms commonly seen in irritable bowl syndrome or other GI ailments. As many as 10 percent of school-aged children have chronic abdominal pain.
The researchers found that over 70% of subjects diagnosed with either irritable bowel syndrome, functional abdominal pain or chronic nonspecific diarrhea who regularly drank more than six ounces of apple juice or pear nectar did not exhibit symptoms after consuming white grape juice instead for one year.
“Fruit juice is an important part of young people's diets, but there are some children who just cannot tolerate the particular carbohydrate profiles of apple juice or pear juice,” explains Marvin Ament, M.D., Chairman, Department of Pediatrics, UCLA School of Medicine. “This is likely due to two factors: these juices have a high fructose to glucose ratio—approximately two to one—and they both contain sorbitol. When the subjects started drinking comparable amounts of white grape juice instead of apple juice or pear juice, we saw no recurrence of symptoms in almost three-quarters of the group. While some of the children may have self-corrected their symptoms, the study suggests that white grape juice played a major role.”
The 28 subjects in the study ranged in age from 9 months to 18 years, but averaged 7 years of age. They averaged 20.4 ounces per day of a combination of apple juice and pear nectar, a minimum of 6 ounces, and were selected because they were previously diagnosed as having irritable bowel syndrome, functional abdominal pain or chronic nonspecific diarrhea. They were initially asked to refrain from juice consumption for one month. After the first month, 13 of the 28 subjects improved. The subjects then resumed consuming juice, but consumed white grape juice, instead of apple or pear, for one year. At the end of the year, 20 of 28 subjects (71%) exhibited no symptoms. Eight experienced no change in their symptoms. The latter were children who had been drinking only 6-12 ounces of apple juice and pear nectar, saw no improvement on a juice-free diet, and no improvement after switching to white grape juice.
“Much research has been done on carbohydrate malabsorption in very young children—six to 18 months of age, for example—and the scientific consensus is that white grape juice is easier to digest than apple or pear in this population. Our study looked at a significantly older population and showed that for some young people, the choice of juice continues to have medical significance well into the teens.”
The study was conducted at the UCLA School of Medicine and SUNY Health Sciences at Brooklyn, published in the April, 2002 issue of Clinical Pediatrics [Clin Pediatr (Phila) 2002; 41:145-150], and was underwritten, in part, by Welch Foods, Inc.
Choose a Category or View All.
