CD Treat: Food Based Diet Study
Cure Crohn’s Colitis funded £50,000 towards the innovative CD-Treat project at the University of Glasgow, which investigates a food-based diet designed to combat Crohn’s disease. The results from this study are promising. CD-Treat, a diet aimed at inducing similar gut microbiome changes as Exclusive Enteral Nutrition (EEN), has been shown to have comparable effects on gut microbial metabolites. The trial, involving 25 healthy adults and five children, demonstrated that CD-Treat was easier to adhere to than EEN while still producing similar beneficial changes in gut bacteria.
In addition, for children, the diet led to significant clinical improvements, with four showing a response to treatment and three entering remission, alongside a reduction in fecal calprotectin, a marker of inflammation. The success of the CD-Treat diet could provide a more practical and socially acceptable alternative to the more restrictive liquid-based EEN diet, which often requires tube feeding due to difficulties in sustaining liquid intake over long periods.
