Inner Happiness

A happy belly and grateful gut are just a few simple lifestyle changes away.

DIGESTIVE problems such as constipation, diarrhoea, heartburn, and stomach cramps are quite common and usually not serious.

However, everyone would want to limit, or prevent, these conditions from occurring frequently and escalating into something more life-threatening.

The good news is that it’s easy to achieve good digestive health. It’s all a matter of making simple lifestyle and dietary changes. This is because the health of your digestive system depends on the food you eat (or don’t eat!), the way you lead your life, and how physically active you are.

Watch what you eat

The digestive system needs to be healthy in order for your body to efficiently digest food and absorb nutrients. A poor diet and unhealthy eating habits such as gulping food down and skipping meals can contribute to digestive disorders. A daily diet of processed foods and foods high in fat, for example, will place your digestive system under a lot of stress, as it needs to work overtime to break down these foods.

Poor nutrition results in a poor digestive system, which can cause the small intestine to lose its ability to absorb nutrients from food. An unhealthy system also causes secretory activity (eg the secretion of digestive enzymes and bile) to decrease (due to damaged accessory glands or intestinal mucosa), reduces fat tolerance, and causes malnutrition - all of which lead to poor digestive health.

Good food and habits for your gut

To ensure your digestive system is in optimal health, try these tips, which are part of the World Gastroenterology Organisation’s global nutritional recommendations to improve digestive health.

·Eat smaller, more frequent meals eg four to five smaller meals rather than two to three large meals a day. But be sure that these smaller meals don’t increase your overall calorie intake!

·Fill up on fibre-rich food like fruit (eg pears, apples, papaya), veggies (eg broccoli, green leafy veggies, leeks), legumes (beans, peas, lentils) and whole grains (multigrain bread, cereal, brown rice).

·Have more fish, at least three to five times a week.

·Choose meat with lower fat contents eg chicken, turkey, or lean cuts of beef.

·Reduce your intake of fatty, greasy, and fried foods.

·Consume probiotics eg cultured milk.

·Drink at least two litres of water daily and decrease consumption of caffeinated, alcoholic, and sugar-rich beverages.

Lifestyle and activity matters

Leading a healthy lifestyle and getting sufficient physical exercise are key to good digestive health, as well as overall wellbeing. Here’s how you can get your digestive system to work optimally:

·Reduce stress
Excessive stress can divert the blood flow from your digestive system. The digestive system responds well to routine. Having set times for certain tasks will benefit your digestion, and can help you feel more in control. If you’re suffering from Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS), stress can also stimulate spasms in your colon.

·Maintain a healthy Body Mass Index (BMI)
Obese or overweight individuals face an increased risk of Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease (GERD) and cancer. Cardiovascular exercise helps strengthen abdominal muscles and reduces sluggishness by stimulating the intestinal muscles to push digestive contents through your system.

· Quit smoking
Smoking affects the entire body, including the digestive system. It lowers pressure at the junction between the stomach and oesophagus, causing a backflow of stomach acid into the oesophageal that can result in heartburn and other complications. Smoking also aggravates peptic ulcers and inflammatory conditions of the bowel, and is linked with an increased risk of numerous cancers.

·Limit consumption of alcoholic, caffeinated, and sugared beverages
These can all affect your digestive health and cause such problems as heartburn and constipation, and worsen disorders like IBS. Alcohol may cause inflammation of your stomach or oesophagus lining and produce heartburn symptoms. Caffeine may cause stomach acid to flow backwards (reflux) and trigger heartburn.

Probiotics and gut health

THE World Gastroenterology Organisation (WGO) recognises probiotics as “live microbes that have been shown in controlled human studies to impart a health benefit.” The WGO believes that their daily consumption can play a role in improving digestive health by modifying the balance of bacteria in the gut in favour of “good” bacteria and by controlling harmful enzyme activity.

Datuk Dr Muhammad Radzi Abu Hassan is president of the Malaysian Society of Gastroenterology & Hepatology (MSGH). This article is courtesy of the society and supported by the Vitagen Healthy Tummies Programme. For a free digestive health booklet by the MSGH, please contact 03-5621 1408 or 03-5632 3301.