Many people with celiac disease are\u00a0advised to eat\u00a0more fibre\u00a0to support digestion and manage symptoms,\u00a0either\u00a0through diet\u00a0or prescribed fibre supplements.\u00a0New research from McMaster University shows that the benefits of that fibre may depend on whether the right bacteria are present in the gut to break it down.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The study, published in\u00a0Nature\u00a0Communications<\/a>\u00a0on\u00a0March\u00a031, found that\u00a0people with celiac\u00a0disease\u00a0had significantly reduced capacity\u00a0to metabolize\u00a0dietary\u00a0fibre in the small intestine.\u00a0This is because\u00a0they\u00a0lacked a key fibre-degrading bacterial family\u00a0called\u00a0Prevotellaceae\u00a0\u2013\u00a0organisms\u00a0that help support gut healing and regulate inflammation.\u00a0<\/p>\n This discovery was observed in both newly diagnosed\u00a0people and in those who have been\u00a0managing\u00a0celiac disease\u00a0for years\u00a0with a\u00a0gluten-free\u00a0diet and\u00a0suggests\u00a0the\u00a0lack\u00a0of\u00a0small intestinal bacteria such as\u00a0Prevotellaceae\u00a0is due to\u00a0persistent microbiome disruptions linked to the disease itself, rather than diet alone.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOriginally,\u00a0we\u00a0thought\u00a0that the problem was that people\u00a0aren\u2019t\u00a0getting enough fibre. Then\u00a0we\u00a0found out that people might not have the right bacteria to use the fibre that\u00a0they\u2019re\u00a0already eating. Adding more fibre\u00a0won\u2019t\u00a0be the solution unless you fix the underlying problems with using\u00a0it,\u201d\u00a0says\u00a0Mark\u00a0Wulczynski, first author of the study and postdoctoral fellow with McMaster\u2019s\u00a0Farncombe Nutrition Initiative<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n Celiac disease\u00a0is a disorder where\u00a0eating\u00a0gluten\u00a0drives\u00a0inflammation in the small intestine. It\u00a0impacts\u00a0approximately\u00a0one per cent of the Canadian population<\/a>, with the only current treatment\u00a0being\u00a0a strict gluten-free diet.\u00a0This is particularly noteworthy because\u00a0the research\u00a0suggests that removing gluten alone\u00a0doesn\u2019t\u00a0fully restore\u00a0the gut\u2019s\u00a0microbiome\u00a0functional\u00a0capacity.\u00a0<\/p>\n Future therapies may need to combine dietary strategies with microbiome\u2011directed approaches, such as microbial restoration or targeted probiotics.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhile a gluten-free diet\u00a0remains\u00a0essential for celiac disease, our findings suggest future therapies may also need to support the gut microbiome. We found reduced fibre-processing activity in the upper gut, the area damaged in celiac disease,\u00a0which is surprising because this part of the gut has not traditionally been seen as a major site of fibre metabolism. This opens the door to combining dietary strategies like added fibre with probiotics\u00a0that can metabolize it,\u201d\u00a0says\u00a0senior author\u00a0Elena Verdu<\/a>,\u00a0professor\u00a0with McMaster\u2019s\u00a0Department of\u00a0Medicine and\u00a0director of the\u00a0Farncombe\u00a0Family Digestive Disease Health Research\u00a0Institute.\u00a0<\/p>\n Not all fibre is alike\u00a0<\/p>\n Using\u00a0preclinical models,\u00a0the\u00a0researchers investigated\u00a0which fibre types are\u00a0actually helpful\u00a0for\u00a0healing the gut.\u00a0They found\u00a0inulin\u00a0\u2013\u00a0a fibre found in everyday foods like bananas,\u00a0chicory\u00a0root,\u00a0garlic\u00a0and onions\u00a0\u2013\u00a0accelerated healing of gluten-induced intestinal injury\u00a0by\u00a0feeding\u00a0the\u00a0small intestinal\u00a0microbiome.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n This effect occurred only with\u00a0the right\u00a0fibres in the diet.\u00a0Another source of fibre,\u00a0Hylon\u00a0VII, a type of corn-based resistant starch commonly used in food manufacturing,\u00a0did not\u00a0affect the microbiome and\u00a0promote healing in the same way\u00a0inulin did.\u00a0<\/p>\n This\u00a0comparison suggests the type of fibre, not just the quantity,\u00a0may be important for people with celiac disease.<\/p>\n To verify this in patients, researchers collected small intestinal fluid from three groups: people newly diagnosed with celiac disease, people who had followed a gluten-free diet for more than two years, and healthy controls. They analyzed the microbiome in these samples to\u00a0determine\u00a0which bacteria were present and whether they carried the genes needed to break down\u00a0different types\u00a0of fibre.<\/p>\n They also\u00a0compared these findings with participants estimated dietary fibre intake and with measurements of plant DNA in stool, providing an objective marker of fibre sources in the diet.\u00a0<\/p>\n The results showed that most individuals, including both healthy controls and celiac patients, consumed less fibre than recommended by Health Canada.\u00a0Health Canada recommends 25-38g of fibre per day for healthy women and men,\u00a0respectively, but\u00a0there are no\u00a0evidence-based\u00a0recommendations for different disease\u00a0states.\u00a0Diseases\u00a0may cause the\u00a0body\u00a0to\u00a0be more active and simultaneously less efficient than usual, affecting nutritional needs.\u00a0<\/p>\n However, celiac patients, whether newly diagnosed or treated with a gluten-free diet, showed a distinct combination of low fibre intake and a lack of bacteria known to break down fibre in the small intestine. This suggests that supporting gut health in celiac disease may require both the right fibre and the right bacteria in the small intestine, known as a\u00a0synbiotic\u00a0approach.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n Future research is needed to better understand and\u00a0determine\u00a0how fibre and microbial restoration could improve symptoms, healing,\u00a0and treatment responses, before making clinical recommendations.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The study was funded by\u00a0a Canadian Institutes of Health Research grant and a J.A. Campbell Young Investigator Award\u00a0to Mark W.\u00a0from Celiac Canada.\u00a0Verdu Holds a Canada Research Chair\u00a0in Microbial Therapeutics and Nutrition in Gastroenterology.\u00a0<\/p>\n Reference:\u00a0Wulczynski M, Constante M, Galipeau HJ, et al. Small intestinal microbial fiber metabolism dysfunction in celiac disease. Nat Commun. 2026;17(1):2698. doi: 10.1038\/s41467-026-70644-4<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n This article has been republished from the following materials<\/a>. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source. Our press release publishing policy can be accessed here<\/a>.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Many people with celiac disease are\u00a0advised to eat\u00a0more fibre\u00a0to support digestion and manage symptoms,\u00a0either\u00a0through diet\u00a0or prescribed fibre supplements.\u00a0New…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":358861,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[134,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-358860","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-health","8":"tag-health","9":"tag-new-zealand","10":"tag-newzealand","11":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358860","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=358860"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/358860\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/358861"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=358860"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=358860"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=358860"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}