I had the test today - a nearly 4 hour test, and I have severe fructose malabsorption. It is a hydrogen breath test. I had to drink 8oz pure fructose and then blow into a little machine every 30 minutes. The tech doing the test said I had a very high reading at one hour. It has to get to your small intestine and then that is where it will be either digested or not. In my case not! I am having the lactose breath test next week.
You can also google it. Apparently it is very common. The test has only been available for about 2 years.
Basically I cannot eat any sugar of any kind, except dextrose. No fructose, sucrose, or sorbitol. That means no fruit, cakes, pies, candy, etc., no tomatoes, corn, carrots, sweet potatoes, cold cuts ( they use fructose to preserve cold cuts), ketchup, mayonnaise, mustards, honey, etc. Nothing made with sugar in it.
I feel like I am finally on the road to recovery! I will also do Dr. Fine's tests just to see. I want to cover all my bases.
I agree. That knowledge should make life a lot easier for you, as you work out your recovery program.
Tex
It is suspected that some of the hardest material known to science can be found in the skulls of GI specialists who insist that diet has nothing to do with the treatment of microscopic colitis.
Hey Pat. Can you get the numbers they got from the test and list them here? I'm interested in the hydrogen and methane levels.
Also, one problem that I've run accross, as mentioned in various studies, is that fructose (and lactose) malabsorbtion tests can be a false positive. In that if you have bacterial overgrowth the results can be wrong. Since both lactose and fructose would be excellent food for the bacteria in bacterial overgrowth, one cannot rule out this without testing specfically for bacterial overgrowth. Might talk with your Dr about this.
Thanks, Mike, I will try to get those numbers. Can you get me the websites of those studies? I need some ammo when talking to the dr. as I had to fight to get this test and the test was done in his office! Go figure!
Wouldn't I have responded to Neomycin back in April if I had SIBO? It made me sick - vomiting sick and severe D.
Pat
Hi Pat,
Hard to say. It could have killed off some of the bad bacteria but perhaps not enough and so the bad ended up outnumbering the good. You could have had bacteria that was not susceptable to this antibiotic. Perhaps this particular antibiotic you are allergic or sensitive to. Those are side effects of antibiotics as well.
And like you're saying it could very well be fructose/lactose malabsorption or even some other issue that's not SIBO.
I'll see if I can dig up the studies.
I look forward to seeing the numbers. It seems that not all Drs are good at interpreting the results. As I've already found out. :(
BACKGROUND: Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth and sugar malabsorption (lactose, fructose, sorbitol) may play a role in irritable bowel syndrome. The lactulose breath test is a reliable and non-invasive test for the diagnosis of small intestinal bacterial overgrowth. The lactose, fructose and sorbitol hydrogen breath tests are widely used to detect specific sugar malabsorption. AIM: To assess the extent to which small intestinal bacterial overgrowth may influence the results of hydrogen sugar breath tests in irritable bowel syndrome patients. METHODS: We enrolled 98 consecutive irritable bowel syndrome patients. All subjects underwent hydrogen lactulose, lactose, fructose and sorbitol hydrogen breath tests. Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth patients were treated with 1-week course of antibiotics. All tests were repeated 1 month after the end of therapy. RESULTS: A positive lactulose breath test was found in 64 of 98 (65%) subjects; these small intestinal bacterial overgrowth patients showed a significantly higher prevalence of positivity to the lactose breath test (P < 0.05), fructose breath test (P < 0.01) and sorbitol breath test (P < 0.01) when compared with the small intestinal bacterial overgrowth-negatives. Small intestinal bacterial overgrowth eradication, as confirmed by negative lactulose breath test, caused a significant reduction in lactose, fructose and sorbitol breath tests positivity (17% vs. 100%, 3% vs. 62%, and 10% vs. 71% respectively: P < 0.0001). CONCLUSIONS: In irritable bowel syndrome patients with small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, sugar breath tests may be falsely abnormal. Eradication of small intestinal bacterial overgrowth normalizes sugar breath tests in the majority of patients. Testing for small intestinal bacterial overgrowth should be performed before other sugar breath tests tests to avoid sugar malabsorption misdiagnosis.
Thanks, Mike. I will request the bacteria test as well. No stones unturned at this point!
I am better, not well but better. The doctor hasn't seen the results yet. The tech told me and gave me literature. I really didn't need to have any one tell me anything though. The way the fructose made me feel spoke pretty loud. Nausea, severe watery D, and flu like aches. I hope I am on the road to recovery!
Pat wrote:Thanks, Mike. I will request the bacteria test as well. No stones unturned at this point!
I am better, not well but better. The doctor hasn't seen the results yet. The tech told me and gave me literature. I really didn't need to have any one tell me anything though. The way the fructose made me feel spoke pretty loud. Nausea, severe watery D, and flu like aches. I hope I am on the road to recovery!
Pat
Yes, I hope you are on the road to recovery as well.
FWIW I may have fructose malabsorption along with the SIBO, as fructose does a number on me as well.
Yeah, I plan on testing fructose intolerance once I'm pretty sure that the SIBO is taken care ofe.
Yeah, I had the bacterial test, took neomycin and felt a lot better, normal BMs, but didn't feel 100%, took rifaximin and got constipated, now I'm on Neomycin again, but I'm very gassy now. :( Why does it have to be this complicated? After the Neomycin is done he has me on a motility drug, perhaps my gut isn't cleaning itself as well as it's supposed to and thus the SIBO keeps coming back. I really wish the science was better here as I want to get better NOW not LATER.
I talked with my nutritionist today. She thinks I would test positive for the bacteria and lactose test right now. She thinks that the reason for the positive test on Fructose is because she thinks I have an overgrowth of Candida. It is the same diet for it also. She thinks I should avoid all grains and just eat meat and cooked veggies. Does this diet sound familiar to this site? She also thinks I should take probiotics. I was taking VSL #3 but stopped for some reason which I can't remember. Fuzzy thinking! Anyway I am taking it again. I forgot to ask her what the numbers were on my Frutose test. I will ask her tomorrow.
Oh, she gave me a really good nutrition web site: www.nutritiondata.com It gives all the nutrition breakdown of any food you type in.
Mike,
I got a copy of the fructose breath test results.
Fasting 0 ppm
30 min. 0 ppm
60 min. 70 ppm
90 min. 74 ppm
120 min. 113 ppm
150 min 96 ppm
180 min 85 ppm
It says that the test is positive if at anytime after the fasting breath the score increases more than 20 ppm
I just talked to the dr. and he is calling in a 2 week script for diflucan. I will continue with the diet also. He doesn't think I will ever have a normal BM. He thinks I will just manage it.
I'm not Mike, (obviously), but I just wanted to point out how much you will enjoy proving your doctor wrong. You'll be able to do it, because you're motivated to do what it takes to resolve the problem, and motivated people get results.
Good luck, and don't forget to tell us his reaction, when you break the news to him that your BMs are back to "blue ribbon" quality.
Tex
It is suspected that some of the hardest material known to science can be found in the skulls of GI specialists who insist that diet has nothing to do with the treatment of microscopic colitis.
I will also do Dr. Fine's tests just to see. I want to cover all my bases.
