An evaluation of autonomic and gastrointestinal symptoms, and gastric emptying, in patients with systemic sclerosis.

Objective: Assessment of gastrointestinal and autonomic symptoms in patients with systemic sclerosis, and possible associations with gastric emptying rate.

Methods: Participant and patient disease-related characteristics were collected. Gastrointestinal and autonomic symptoms were assessed by the UCLA-SCTC GIT 2.

Consumption of the Non-Nutritive Sweetener Stevia for 12 Weeks Does Not Alter the Composition of the Human Gut Microbiota.

The use of non-nutritive sweeteners (NNSs) as an alternative to caloric sugars has increased in recent years. Stevia is an NNS that has demonstrated beneficial effects on appetite and energy intake. However, the impact on the gut microbiota is not well understood.

Chronotype in Patients With Immune-Mediated Inflammatory Disease: A Systematic Review.

Immune-mediated inflammatory diseases (IMIDs) such as rheumatoid arthritis, inflammatory bowel disease, and asthma share common pathophysiological pathways characterized by chronic inflammation and subsequent tissue damage involving multiple body sites. Circadian rhythms are 24-h body cycles that regulate immune activity and control the magnitude of immune response based on time of day. Chronotype is a person's individual circadian phase preference, ranging from morningness to eveningness, which is known to influence the risk of cardiometabolic and mental health disease.

Mapping the Homeostatic and Hedonic Brain Responses to Stevia Compared to Caloric Sweeteners and Water: A Double-Blind Randomised Controlled Crossover Trial in Healthy Adults.

Non-nutritive sweeteners have potential effects on brain function. We investigated neural correlates of responses to beverages differing in sweetness and calories. Healthy participants completed 4 randomised sessions: water vs.

The need to accurately measure energy intake and expenditure in patients with systemic sclerosis.

Background: Malnutrition is common in systemic sclerosis and patients are frequently underweight. However, the balance between assessed dietary energy intake versus expenditure has been neglected to date. This study aimed to assess energy (dietary) intakes and expenditures and to compare discrepancies in systemic sclerosis.

NIH Workshop Report: sensory nutrition and disease.

In November 2019, the NIH held the "Sensory Nutrition and Disease" workshop to challenge multidisciplinary researchers working at the interface of sensory science, food science, psychology, neuroscience, nutrition, and health sciences to explore how chemosensation influences dietary choice and health. This report summarizes deliberations of the workshop, as well as follow-up discussion in the wake of the current pandemic. Three topics were addressed: A) the need to optimize human chemosensory testing and assessment, B) the plasticity of chemosensory systems, and C) the interplay of chemosensory signals, cognitive signals, dietary intake, and metabolism.

Nutritional status and predictors of weight loss in patients with systemic sclerosis.

Background & Aims: Systemic sclerosis (SSc) commonly affects the gastrointestinal (GI) tract and predisposes to malnutrition. Few studies assessed body composition in outpatients with SSc or used more than one method for comparison over time. The aim of this study was to describe markers of nutrition and body composition in patients with SSc and to identify predictors of unintentional weight loss.

Effects of the Daily Consumption of Stevia on Glucose Homeostasis, Body Weight, and Energy Intake: A Randomised Open-Label 12-Week Trial in Healthy Adults.

Stevia is a non-nutritive sweetener, providing sweet taste with no calories. This randomised, controlled, open-label 2-parallel arm trial examined the effects of daily stevia consumption on glycaemia in healthy adults. Secondary endpoints included body weight (BW) and energy intake (EI).

Randomised clinical trial of a gastrointestinal care bundle to reduce symptoms in patients with pelvic cancer undergoing chemoradiotherapy.

Objective: Pelvic radiotherapy is used to treat 17 000 people in the UK each year. Eight in 10 develop difficult bowel problems during pelvic treatment, especially diarrhoea, urgency and incontinence. Some cannot complete treatment, reducing the chance of cancer cure.

Appetite, the enteroendocrine system, gastrointestinal disease and obesity.

The enteroendocrine system is located in the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, and makes up the largest endocrine system in the human body. Despite that, its roles and functions remain incompletely understood. Gut regulatory peptides are the main products of enteroendocrine cells, and play an integral role in the digestion and absorption of nutrients through their effect on intestinal secretions and gut motility.

Stevia Beverage Consumption prior to Lunch Reduces Appetite and Total Energy Intake without Affecting Glycemia or Attentional Bias to Food Cues: A Double-Blind Randomized Controlled Trial in Healthy Adults.

Background: Stevia is a zero-calorie alternative to caloric sugars. Substituting caloric sweeteners with noncaloric sweeteners reduces available energy, but their effects on appetite, subsequent food intake, and neurocognitive responses are still unclear.

Objective: The aim was to examine whether sweetness with or without calories influences food intake, appetite, blood glucose concentrations, and attentional bias (AB) to food cues.

Attentional bias to food varies as a function of metabolic state independent of weight status.

Eating behaviour requires that internal metabolic changes are recognized by the central nervous system which regulates brain responses to food cues. This function may be altered in obesity. The aim of this study was to examine potential differences in neurocognitive responses to visual food cues as a function of metabolic state and weight status.

The gut-skin axis in health and disease: A paradigm with therapeutic implications.

As crucial interface organs gut and skin have much in common. Therefore it is unsurprising that several gut pathologies have skin co-morbidities. Nevertheless, the reason for this remains ill explored, and neither mainstream gastroenterology nor dermatology research have systematically investigated the 'gut-skin axis'.

Human brain responses to gastrointestinal nutrients and gut hormones.

Functional mapping of human brain activation has made it possible to understand how different nutrients in the gut impact on homeostatic and appetitive brain responses. Current data are limited, but nutrient-specific effects are observed, with differential responses to lipid and sugars. Responses are not a simple function of calorie intake.

Dietary Practices and Beliefs in Patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease.

Background: An epidemiological association implicating diet in IBD risk or protection is widely accepted. Patients with IBD often make links to diet, but there is a dearth of literature exploring dietary perceptions and practices in this population. Our objective was to evaluate dietary beliefs and behaviors in IBD patients.

Long-term outcome of patients with systemic sclerosis requiring home parenteral nutrition.

Background & Aims: Patients with systemic sclerosis may develop intestinal failure requiring home parenteral nutrition. However, few outcome data have been reported. This study aimed to review the outcome of patients with systemic sclerosis receiving home parenteral nutrition.

Duodenal CCK cells from male mice express multiple hormones including ghrelin.

Enteroendocrine (EEC) cells have a pivotal role in intestinal nutrient sensing and release hormones that orchestrate food digestion and regulate appetite. EEC cells are found scattered throughout the intestine and have typically been classified based on the primary hormone they contain. I cells represent a subset of EEC cells that secrete cholecystokinin (CCK) and are mainly localized to the duodenum.

Mapping glucose-mediated gut-to-brain signalling pathways in humans.

Objectives: Previous fMRI studies have demonstrated that glucose decreases the hypothalamic BOLD response in humans. However, the mechanisms underlying the CNS response to glucose have not been defined. We recently demonstrated that the slowing of gastric emptying by glucose is dependent on activation of the gut peptide cholecystokinin (CCK1) receptor.

Enteroendocrine cells in gastrointestinal pathophysiology.

Enteroendocrine cells in the gastrointestinal tract play an important role in the regulation of appetite and digestive responses through the secretion of peptides. Their involvement in gastrointestinal diseases has been acknowledged, but relatively few studies have sought to clearly define their role in the pathogenesis or as therapeutic targets. Recent, but still limited, work has identified new roles for EEC in GI diseases.

Genetic analysis of the Trichuris muris-induced model of colitis reveals QTL overlap and a novel gene cluster for establishing colonic inflammation.

Background: Genetic susceptibility to colonic inflammation is poorly defined at the gene level. Although Genome Wide Association studies (GWAS) have identified loci in the human genome which confer susceptibility to Inflammatory Bowel Disease (Crohn's and Ulcerative Colitis), it is not clear if precise loci exist which confer susceptibility to inflammation at specific locations within the gut e.g.

Adaptive immunity alters distinct host feeding pathways during nematode induced inflammation, a novel mechanism in parasite expulsion.

Gastrointestinal infection is often associated with hypophagia and weight loss; however, the precise mechanisms governing these responses remain poorly defined. Furthermore, the possibility that alterations in feeding during infection may be beneficial to the host requires further study. We used the nematode Trichinella spiralis, which transiently inhabits the small intestine before migrating to skeletal muscle, as a biphasic model of infection to determine the cellular and molecular pathways controlling feeding during enteric and peripheral inflammation.

Ageing and the gut.

The goal of this brief review is to address the role of the ageing gut in the genesis of malnutrition in the elderly. We assess the burden of malnutrition in the elderly, exploring the role of comorbid conditions and neurohumoral changes that take place to contribute towards the process of anorexia associated with ageing. Following this, the review assesses physiological changes that occur in each part of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract and what implication they may have in clinical practice.

Crohn's disease affecting the small bowel is associated with reduced appetite and elevated levels of circulating gut peptides.

Background & Aims: Appetite disturbance is an important nutritional issue in Crohn's disease (CD), but the biological basis is unclear. Satiety signals such as polypeptide YY (PYY) and glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) are produced by enteroendocrine cells (EEC). In animal models, upregulation of EEC plays a mechanistic role in feeding disturbance and weight loss.