Gene/Protein Disease Symptom Drug Enzyme Compound
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Query: UMLS:C0024523 (malabsorption)
 7,319 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

Trehalose is a disaccharide, the main dietary source being mushrooms. It has been approved as an additive in the preparation of dried food. Isolated intestinal trehalase deficiency is found in 8% of Greenlanders, but is rare elsewhere. The normal range of trehalase activity and the incidence of isolated trehalase deficiency in the UK have not been reported. Patients (n 400) were investigated for suspected malabsorption. Endoscopic distal duodenal biopsies were taken for histological assessment and maltase, sucrase, lactase and trehalase estimation. Disaccharidase activities were determined by Dahlqvist's technique (Dahlqvist, 1968). Most patients (n 369) had normal duodenal histology. In these, square root transformation of trehalase activity produced a normal distribution. The normal range (mean +/- 2 SD) was 4.79-37.12 U/g protein. One patient had an isolated borderline trehalase deficiency. The thirty-one patients with villous atrophy had significantly reduced disaccharidase activities. With ingestion of a gluten-free diet, maltase, sucrase and trehalase activities recovered to normal in most patients, whereas lactase activity did not. The normal range and very low incidence of isolated enzyme deficiency is comparable with that described in populations from the USA and mainland Europe. Activity is significantly reduced in untreated coeliac disease and recovers with treatment with a gluten-free diet. There is no place for routine determination of trehalase activity in the UK population and there should be no concern over the introduction of trehalose-containing dried foods.
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PMID:Intestinal trehalase activity in a UK population: establishing a normal range and the effect of disease. 1088 12

Carbohydrate malabsorption is a frequent clinical condition, often associated with abdominal symptoms. Although lactose represents the most commonly malabsorbed sugar, also other carbohydrates, such as fructose, trehalose and sorbitol may be incorrectly absorbed in the small intestine. Fructose malabsorption seems more common in patients with functional bowel disease, even if randomized and controlled studies on these topic were few and on small samples. Interpretation of breath hydrogen testing is difficult. In particular, neither studies comparing this test with a gold standard, nor validated doses and concentrations to be used, are available. Trehalose malabsorption due to trehalase deficiency represents a very rare condition and available studies do not support its relevance in clinical practice. Sorbitol absorption is dose and concentration related, and depends on the entity of intestinal absorption surface. Nevertheless, the finding of its malabsorption is not expression of a specific cause of intestinal bowel damage. From available data, it is not possible to draw definite conclusions about clinical relevance of fructose, trehalose and sorbitol malabsorption, as well as, about diagnostic accuracy of commonly used tests to detect all these conditions. On the other hand, in patients who refer abdominal discomfort after ingestion of different carbohydrate-containing foods, a small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, should be promptly considered. This is because the large amount of intestinal bacteria may unspecifically ferment sugars, causing an abnormal H2 production and consequently a misleading diagnosis of sugar malabsorption.
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PMID:Fructose, trehalose and sorbitol malabsorption. 2444 64