Most parents are familiar with lactose intolerance--the inability to properly digest lactose, the sugar found in milk. Now there's evidence that an intolerance to another sugar--fructose--may cause similar problems.
Fructose is the sugar found in honey, fruits, and some soft drinks. It's also used as a sweetener in many foods. Researchers at the University of Kansas found that many people can't properly digest fructose. The malabsorption leads to the release of hydrogen gas, causing diarrhea, and abdominal pain and bloating.
One way to determine if a person has fructose malabsorption is to measure the amount of hydrogen in his breath after consuming fructose containing food. Researchers measured the breath hydrogen content in 25 people who had consumed 25 grams of fructose--the amount of fructose found in a 12 ounce can of soft drink sweetened with high fructose corn syrup. Almost half of the subjects had an increased level of breath hydrogen. If the sugar had been properly digested, their breath should have been just about hydrogen free.
"When given levels of fructose commonly consumed in the Western diet, a significant number of our subjects had both objective and subjective evidence of fructose malabsorption, meaning that the breath analysis showed hydrogen in excess of 20 parts per million, and they had symptoms like gas and diarrhea," said Paul Beyer, the lead researcher.
If your child has persistent stomach problems, eliminating fructose from his diet may help. Another approach is for his doctor to perform the breath hydrogen test. This test is available in many doctor's offices and most hospitals.
HealthScout News Service, 10/29/02.
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