# Diminishing Wind...



## Island girl (Jul 24, 2000)

Flatulence Shut Down Your Gas Engine Why does it always happen in a crowded elevator? No one knows. What doctors do know is that everybody thinks they pass too much gas. Chances are, though, that you're all well within the normal range. On any given day, your average Jane releases gas 14 times. If you pass more, it doesn't mean that something is wrong. Most likely, the culprit is in what you eat. Or in your lifestyle. Or it's just plain bad luck. (Some people are just more prone to giving off gas than others.) DIMINISHING WINDS If you're tired of sounding like the little engine that could, here are some ways to lower your octane level. Quick! Buy some activated charcoal. If you can feel gas building up, and there's a crowded elevator in your immediate future, stop off at a drugstore and try Charcoal Plus, an over-the-counter remedy that can help absorb gas trapped in your colon, says Jacqueline Wolf, M.D., a gastroenterologist, assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and co-director of the Inflammatory Bowel Disease Center at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston. Chew your food. "The more slowly you eat, the less air you swallow, and the better your food is broken down, so the less likely you are to suffer from gas," says Barbara Frank, M.D., gastroenterologist and clinical professor of medicine at Allegheny Universtiy of the Health Sciences MCP-Hahnemann School of Medicine in Philadelphia. Taking more time at meals can prevent future gas attacks. Watch for gas producers. "Among the top culprits are cabbage, corn and beans," says Linda Lee, M.D., assistant professor of medicine in the Division of Gastroenterology at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore. In fact, many fruits and vegetables are big gas producers. (But they're also high in fiber and low in fat, and they've been shown to reduce rates of colon cancer, the second biggest cancer killer in the United States.) In other words, high-fiber foods are good for you. So before eliminating them from your diet, see how you react when you eat them. If they bother you, try eating smaller amounts or substitute other high-fiber foods (like whole-wheat cereal or bran flakes) that may be easier for you to digest, says Dr. Lee. Complete elimination is not desirable, so try different high-fiber foods to find the ones that you tolerate best. Degassing the beans. Indigestible sugars in beans are notorious gas producers. If you elect to keep high-fiber beans in your diet, help is at hand, says Dr. Wolf. Before cooking, soak dry beans overnight in a potful of water with a couple of tablespoons of vinegar to reduce gassiness. Sprinkle on the enzyme mix. Beano, an over-the-counter liquid enzyme that breaks down the indigestible sugars in beans, works well on dense beans like limas or lentils, says Dr. Lee. Just sprinkle several drops right on the beans just before eating. Or buy Beano in tablet form and take two tablets before you eat. "Unfortunately, Beano doesn't work as well on high-fiber, high gas-producing vegetables like cauliflower and broccoli," Dr. Lee says. Stay away from sugarless. Few women realize that sorbitol, a natural sugar used in sugarless gums and candies and many diet sodas, is hard to digest and causes gas, says Dr. Lee. So park the gum and see if circumstances improve. Uncarbonate your life. The bubbles and fizz in carbonated beverages such as soda, beer, champagne and sparkling water produce lots of gas, says Dr. Lee. She advises women who complain of gas to drink water or low-calorie, low-sugar fruit juices instead, especially with large meals. "Eating a lot and then adding beer or soda bubbles is an invitation for gas," says Dr. Frank. Cut out the caffeine. "Caffeine irritates the colon," and an irritated colon is often a noisy, gassy one, says Dr. Lee. And remember, cutting out coffee alone is not enough: Tea, chocolate and most sodas also contain caffeine. Exercise. "Moving around keeps your bowels on the move and prevents gas from getting--and staying--trapped," says Robyn Karlstadt, M.D., a gastroenterologist at Graduate Hospital in Philadelphia. Getting just 30 minutes a day three times a week of any kind of aerobic exercise--the kind that gets your heart pumping, like walking, swimming or cycling--will help defuse the gas.


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