Studies show more than 90% of Americans fall short on fiber in their diet.
Fiber is a key nutrient for promoting gut health – or what’s also known as gastrointestinal health or G-I.
Melissa Mendez, a registered dietitian at Parkland Health, tells KERA’s Sam Baker how fiber contributes to gut health.
Mendez: We have trillions of microbiota or healthy bacteria in our intestines. Just like any live organism, humans, they have to eat. I would consider them a probiotic.
The live organisms need to have something called prebiotics, which is the food that they eat. So, by us eating healthy items, they’re going to get the food they need to work in our body to protect us and keep us healthy.
Baker: When we say the food that they need to eat, are we primarily talking about fiber?
Mendez: We are. There are plenty of foods that have fiber that are going to help us with our intestines. There’s soluble fiber and there’s insoluble fiber.
Baker: What’s the difference?
Mendez: Soluble fiber, when you mix it with water, it’s kind of gel-like. So, some examples would be: oats. Mix it with the water and it gets kind of gel- like, right? Bananas, mix it water and you get this gel-like sauce. The inside of an apple, you can get like an apple sauce, right? So it mixes well with water. This really helps us feed the microbiota in our intestines. It’s a prebiotic.
There is something called insoluble fiber. And that’s when we think of something very tough to chew through, like celery sticks, right? If you were to mix celery sticks with water, it stays the same. That actually helps bulk up our stool, and it helps us with bowel movements, clearing our intestines.
Baker: So, one is not better than the other. You need both?
Mendez: Some items actually have both of them. Spinach has both soluble fiber and insoluble fiber. Or fruit. If you eat one with the skin, you’re be getting insoluble and soluble. So that would be like our pears, apples.
Baker: Do we need to be careful though about what kind of fiber and or how we consume it?
Mendez: The one thing I would say is try not to increase significant amounts at one time. If I’ve never eaten fiber, I don’t want it to be where it’s zero fiber and now I’m getting so much fiber at the beginning because it does start to cause negative G-I symptoms of flatulence, bloating. My body’s still not used to these changes. So, add little bits every day, every week.
Baker: What else besides fiber helps keep gut health in check?
Mendez: We want to make sure that we’re getting our probiotics. We naturally already have healthy bacteria, but we can always introduce a little bit more. So, these would be things that are fermented.
The biggest one that we see everywhere is our yogurt. That would be a great example, a great way to add something healthy to our diet. And not only do we get good bacteria, but we’re also getting calcium, vitamin D, we get protein.
We’ve also got kimchi, sauerkraut. Those are a couple of ideas where we can add additional great bacteria to help us even more with our immune system.
Baker: While there are many sources of fiber, though, the thing people always suggest is, well, can’t they just do it with a supplement?
Mendez: It’s recommended not to take a supplement. Those are really reserved for the hospital setting. If there’s something very high risk, there’s complications going on, that’s for a doctor’s discretion to use.
The other thing I want to mention here is that supplements are not FDA regulated, so you don’t really know what you’re getting. What the pill has does not have to be mentioned in the label. So they may not match when you’re reading the label.
So again, I would say stick with the diet. I’d rather enjoy the foods versus taking a supplement or a pill.
RESOURCES:
Dietary Fiber Intake and Gut Microbiota in Human Health/
Dietary fiber: Essential for a healthy diet
The gut microbiome: linking dietary fiber to inflammatory diseases
How – and why – to fit more fiber and fermented food into your meals