And now, thanks to a new study, we know a little bit more about which preventive measures make a difference, and by how much. The study included more than 200,000 adults in the United States and Europe and looked at factors like diet (including fruit, vegetable, fiber, and red meat intake), tobacco use, body mass index (BMI), nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) use, physical activity level, and adherence to certain healthy lifestyle factors.
It found that those who generally invested in healthy lifestyle factors like eating fruits and vegetables, getting enough fiber, and engaging in regular exercise—and generally avoided unhealthy ones like having a high BMI and smoking—could prevent about 61% of Crohn’s disease cases and about 42% of ulcerative colitis cases.
Nevertheless, the study did have some limitations. For example, stress, which has a known link to IBD1 and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), was not included as one of the lifestyle factors. Even so, as Emily W. Lopes, MPH, and one of the study’s authors, explained to Medical News Today, “…adherence to a number of dietary and lifestyle factors known to be associated with risk of Crohn’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) could have prevented a substantial number of cases.”
Gretchen Lidicker, M.S.
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