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Dietary Causes of Gallstones Information
Introduction
There are many conditions in Western industrialised societies today that were unheard of, or at least very rare, just a century ago. The same conditions are still unheard of in primitive peoples who do not have the 'benefits' of our knowledge. There is a very good reason for this: They eat what Nature intended; we don't. The diseases caused by our incorrect and unnatural diets are those featured on these pages.
Dietary causes:
Fasting, low-fat diet, missing breakfastLow-fat diet is major cause of gallstones
Fair, fat and forty. That is the general perception of someone with gallstones. For this reason gallstones, often found in fat people, are usually attributed to a diet high in fats. In fact this is the opposite of the truth: Gallstones are caused by eating too little fat rather than too much.
Fats are not soluble in water. Before dietary fat can be digested, it has to be emulsified. Bile is used for this purpose. The liver makes bile continuously and stores it in the gall bladder until such time as it is needed. However, if a low-fat diet is eaten, that bile remains in the gall bladder.
Gallstones are formed when the gall bladder is not emptied on a regular basis. In people who continually resort to low-fat diets, bile is stored for long periods in the gall bladder — and it stagnates. In time — and it is really quite a short time — a 'sludge' begins to form. This then coagulates to form small stones which then become bigger. The speed with which this happens was dramatically demonstrated in a trial at several American University hospitals.[1] None of the subjects had any sign of gall bladder disease at the start of the study. However, after only eight weeks of low-fat dieting, more than a quarter had developed gallstones. Where they were fed intravenously, half developed gall bladder sludge after three weeks, and all had developed it by six weeks. Nearly half of those who developed sludge also formed gallstones.
Don't miss breakfast
Missing breakfast may also increase the risk of gallstones. In a study of French women with gallstones, it was found that they fasted on average for two hours longer overnight than women without the disease.[2]
Study has also shown that body fat around your middle rather than overall fatness also increases the risk of gallstones.[3] This is no surprise as this, an indicator of the metabolic syndrome, is also caused by eating a carbohydrate-rich, low-fat diet.
The pain that someone with gallstones gets is when these are passed through the bile duct with the bile in response to a fatty meal and get stuck. Bile is then unable to enter the bowel, leading to biliary colic and its related symptoms: poor digestion, bloating, burping, flatulence, nausea, vomiting and sometimes jaundice.
So, it is a low-fat diet which causes the gallstones, but it is eating a high-fat diet that makes them apparent. If you eat a low-fat diet and never eat fat again, then you won't get the pain, even though the stones are there. The doctor who says that the gallstones are caused by high-fat is actually saying that the symptoms are caused by the fat.
If someone suffers from gallstones, a low-fat diet 'prevents' the symptoms, so doctors often suggest such a diet. But it makes the cause of the symptoms (gallstones) worse. Doctors are often loath to operate to remove the stones, so just preventing you knowing about them seems to them to be a good compromise — despite the fact that you will then be miserable and hungry as a result!
References
[1]. Liddle RA, et al. Gallstone formation during weight-reduction dieting. Arch Intern Med. 1989; 149: 1750-53.
[2]. Heaton KW. Breakfast — do we need it? Report of a meeting of the Forum on Food and Health, 16 June 1989. J R Soc Med 1989; 82: 770-1.
[3]. Tsai C-J, Leitzmann MF, Willett WC, Giovannucci EL. Prospective study of abdominal adiposity and gallstone disease in US men. Am J Clin Nutr 2004; 80: 38—44.
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