A guide to IBD-focused diets

IBD-Aid vs. SCD Diet vs. Med Diet

Note: A big thank you to Kim Beall, PharmD. At Nutritional Therapy For IBD, she oversees public education and was the inspiration and leading resource for this post. She was a recent guest on my podcast and discussed tools the organization has created for IBD patients and their families. Watch the podcast here.

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I am often asked for help with the dietary approaches for managing Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD), focusing on the Mediterranean, IBD-AID, and Specific Carbohydrate Diet (SCD).

Many things go into my answer. I often ask questions to clarify.

Such as, where is your IBD? Is it in the small intestine or large intestine? That matters as to which diet is likely to help the most.

Also, what types of foods do you see yourself eating? What types of foods does your family like? What foods are most important in your culture? Also, which foods do you intuitively know help, and which ones intuitively aggravate?

I do everything in my power to reduce the risk of Avoid/Restrictive Food Intake Disorder, which is very common in IBD. This is much easier said than done for IBD patients who are flaring or if the disease is not controlled. I discuss this topic with Julia Hollenberg, RD, MSN, here.