NBC NEWS – Everybody poops, but how often people go could reveal a lot about their long-term health, according to research published Tuesday in the journal Cell Reports Medicine.
The study of more than 1,400 healthy adults found that people who pooped less frequently also had signs of decreased kidney function.
People on the other end of the spectrum, who went far more than normal, showed signs of impaired liver function.
“It’s well-known that things like constipation are associated with chronic disease,” said study co-author Sean Gibbons, an associate professor at the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle.
What is less apparent is which comes first — the constipation or the chronic disease? Does constipation early in life cause chronic illness in otherwise healthy people, or is constipation a result of chronic disease?
“The study found the ideal number of bowel movements for optimal health was one or two a day.”
Gibbons and his team used data from a now-defunct wellness company called Arivale to try to answer that question. The study participants were healthy, mostly white adults living in the Pacific Northwest.
The researchers analyzed blood and stool samples and body mass index measurements, as well as responses to questionnaires about diet and exercise habits and mental health.
From the blood samples, the team was able to detect chemicals in the blood that indicated low organ function, including low-functioning kidneys and livers.
From the stool samples, the researchers were able to genetically sequence each person’s gut microbiome, which told them the makeup of beneficial and potentially harmful microbes living there.
The researchers separated participants into groups based on how frequently they pooped:
one or two bowel movements per week, three to six bowel movements per week, one to three bowel movements per day and diarrhea, which they defined as four or more times per day …
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