Eating a high-fiber diet does not lower a person's risk of diverticulosis, but a low-fiber diet might

Eating a high-fiber diet does not lower a person's risk of diverticulosis, but a low-fiber diet might, according to a new study that contradicts what doctors have believed for decades.

Diverticulosis is a disease of the intestines in which pouches develop in the colon wall.

Researchers at the University of North Carolina School of Medicine analyzed data from more than 2,100 patients, aged 30 to 80, who underwent outpatient colonoscopy between 1998 and 2010. The patients were interviewed about their diet, bowel movements and level of physical activity.

Patients with the lowest fiber intake were 30 percent less likely to develop diverticulosis than those with the highest intake, according to the study published in the February issue of the journal Gastroenterology.

The findings also showed that constipation was not a risk factor and that having more frequent bowel movements was linked to an increased risk. Those with more than 15 bowel movements a week were 70 percent more likely to develop diverticulosis than those with fewer than seven bowel movements a week, the investigators noted.

However, while the study uncovered an association between fiber consumption, bowel movements and diverticulosis risk, it did not prove a cause-and-effect relationship.

In addition, no association was seen between diverticulosis and physical inactivity or intake of fat or red meat.

"While it is too early to tell patients what to do differently, these results are exciting for researchers," study lead researcher Dr. Anne Peery, a fellow in the gastroenterology and hepatology division, said in a university news release. "Figuring out that we don't know something gives us the opportunity to look at disease processes in new ways."

Diverticulosis affects about one-third of U.S. adults older than 60, according to the news release. Most cases don't cause symptoms, but the condition can cause complications such as bleeding, infections, intestinal perforations and even death.

More information

The U.S. National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases has more about diverticulosis and diverticulitis.

Only 1% of Facebook 'Fans' Engage With Brands

For a few years now, brands have been touting frothy Facebook "like" numbers as evidence of their social-media acumen. But how many of those fans are actually bothering to take part in conversation with brands?

Not too many, as it turns out.

Slightly more than 1% of fans of the biggest brands on Facebook are actually engaging with the brands, according to a study from the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute, an Australia-based marketing think tank that counts Procter & Gamble, Coca-Cola and other major advertisers as its supporters.

To get to these findings, the researchers used one of Facebook's own metrics, People Talking About This, the awkwardly-named running count of likes, posts, comments, tags, shares and other ways a user of the social network can interact with branded pages. It was unveiled last fall as a way of giving advertisers a sharper look at at the level of activity on their pages.

Researchers for the institute looked at this metric as a proportion of overall fan growth of the top 200 brands on Facebook over a six-week period back in October and they found the percentage of People Talking About This to overall fans to be 1.3%. If you subtract new likes, which only requires a click and in the minds of the researchers are akin to TV ratings, and isolate for more engaged forms of interaction, you're left within an even smaller number: 0.45%. That means less than half a percent of people who identify themselves as like a brand actually bother to create any content around it.

You might assume these are damning numbers. But this isn't necessarily the case.

"I don't think it's a bad thing," said Karen Nelson-Field, senior research associate for Ehrenberg-Bass Institute who describes herself as a "Facebook advocate." "People need to understand what it can do for a brand and what it can't do. Facebook doesn't really differ from mass media. It's great to get decent reach, but to change the way people interact with a brand overnight is just unrealistic."

In the background here is the thinking of Andrew Ehrenberg, the late mathematician who was highly skeptical of conventional marketing wisdom. In dense statistically-oriented papers, he cast doubt on concepts such as brand loyalty and was never sold on the persuasive power of advertising. Now his disciples advocate achieving broad reach through mass media. Brand growth, they maintain, is attained not by reaching a few loyal fans but a larger number of light and medium buyers. In this understanding of the marketing and media worlds, social is just another media channel useful for its reach rather than any notion of engagement.

This research jibes with that thinking, as does a separate study from Ms. Nelson-Field looking at the distribution of buying behavior among Facebook fan bases. In that study, she used web-based consumer panels to examine the behavior of Facebook fans of two unnamed repeat-purchased brands, in the chocolate and soft-drink categories. The key finding was a much greater occurrence of heavy buyers in the Facebook population than in a more general population of customers. The study also found that purchase frequency didn't increase after someone became a fan.

In other words, Facebook fan bases skew toward heavy buyers rather than the more casual shoppers that a brands needs to reach in order to grow. Again, unless you're someone who believes marketing on Facebook alone constitutes a full strategy or you're lining up for the inevitable Facebook IPO, this isn't all bad news. Facebook does provide good reach and its audience of loyal fans is good for market research and word-of-mouth advocacy.

If there's an overall caution, it's against, in the words of Ms. Nelson-Field, "putting a disproportionate amount of effort into engagement and strategies to get people to talk about a brand, when you should be spending more time getting more light buyers."

51% OF FOOD INSPECTIONS FAIL IN CHINA

Food safety has been China’s Achilles heel for the past few years, and new data that reveals 51% of food inspections conducted in Mainland China during 2011 failed only adds to country’s food-safety woes.

According to the recent AsiaInspection 2011 Q4 Barometer, a quarterly synopsis of Asia-based manufacturing and the quality control services industry, while the majority of these inspections were failed because of minor defects, 10% were for critical defects with an extreme case involving contamination by a large quantity of rodent fecal matter. The fact that over half of all Chinese food inspections fail is even more alarming when compared to an average failure rate for non-food products of about 30%.

China’s State Administration for Industry and Commerce also reported 62,000 illegal food cases were reported in 2011. Authorities also stopped the operation of 43,000 unlicensed food-producing businesses found to be operating illegally and revoked the business licenses of 576 operators during the same period.

The report also noted food packaging had a 57% inspection failure rate in 2011. “Food packaging defects may not seem critical," said Sebastien Breteau, CEO of AsiaInspection. “But by the time food leaves the factory and hits store shelves, toxic amounts of contaminants like formaldehyde and lead can leech out of packaging, contaminate food and cause serious harm to consumers."

“China exported over 4.5 billion tons of food in 2011 alone," said Antoine Bloch, Asia Pacific Vice President of Silliker, a partner of AsiaFoodInspection with AsiaInspection. “With chemical and natural contaminants threatening food available to all of us, the need for prevention in the form of comprehensive laboratory testing has never been clearer."

Sources:

·                                 Business Wire: AsiaInspection 2011 Q4 Barometer: 1 in Every 2 Food Inspections Failed in China in 2011

Lose weight while dining out: Study reveals 6 tips

Eating at restaurants frequently, which can mean consuming large portions of high-calorie foods, could boost your risk of becoming obese. But there may be a way to eat out and still lose weight, a new study suggests.

 Researchers looked at 35 middle-aged women and found that after six weeks of following a weight gain prevention program, they lost more weight than women who didn't follow the program.

In the program, researchers suggested that when dining out, the women should ask that half of their meal be boxed up "to go" before they started eating, and should look up calorie information on restaurants' websites, along with other advice.

"Being able to control and manage what you eat is useful," said lead author Gayle Timmerman, a nurse who studies eating patterns and weight in women at the University of Texas. "But you need some knowledge and skills in order to do that."

The study is published today (Jan. 10) in the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior.

Over the past several decades, the percentage of our total spending on food that goes to eating out has risen. In 1970, 26 percent of all food spending was on food away from home, but by 2005, that number had climbed to 41 percent, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

"Restaurants are a high-risk food environment," Timmerman said. "If you don't have a strategy, it's easy to gain weight and eat more without intending to."

In fact, a 2011 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association suggests that lower-calorie foods purchased in restaurants may contain more calories than listed.

The study included 35 healthy women between the ages of 40 to 59 years who ate out frequently. Nineteen of the women were given instructions about how to prevent weight gain, 16 were not.

Women in the prevention group attended six weekly, 2-hour sessions. Each session included discussions on managing weight, weekly goals, eating out strategies and mindful eating meditation, which involved exercises aimed at helping the women appreciate the sight, smell and texture of eating food.

As an incentive, those in the prevention group were given a $20 gift card during the first part of the study and a $30 gift card at the end of the study.

By the end of the study, researchers found women in the weight gain prevention group consumed less calories and fat than women who were not in the prevention program.

On average, women who participated in the prevention program lost close to four pounds, whereas women in the control group lost about half a pound.

Moreover, the number of times women ate out didn't decrease over the course of the study, indicating that women were able to manage their weight while continuing their habits of dining out.

Judy Stern, a nutritionist from the University of California, Davis, however wasn't too impressed with the study's findings.

"If you're overweight, and I gave you some incentive to lose weight, you would probably lose weight," Stern said. "While I appreciate the efforts they went through in this study, I'm underwhelmed."

She also noted that the study could have been strengthened by being longer. But she did find the study to be a step in the right direction. "It's increasing our awareness of what we're eating," she said.

Along with boxing up half of a meal before starting to eat, and researching calorie counts, here are the tips the researchers gave study participants:

·                 Budget your calories. If you know you're going to be dining out, eat a lighter meal, but don't a skip meal. You might overeat later.

·                 Pay attention to what you're eating and enjoy the experience. Try to chew slowly and savor it.

·                 Avoid "unloved" calories. Do you really enjoy eating cold fries? Skip food you feel neutral about—but that doesn't mean you can pass on your veggies.

·                 Order salad dressings, sauces and gravy on the side. That way you control how much you put on your food.