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Chewing Gum After Bowel Sugery.

By Chris Rangel MD ⋅ February 18, 2008 ⋅  Email this post ⋅  Print this post ⋅ Post a comment

Whenever the bowels are operated on they respond by essentially shutting down and stop moving (likely a natural defense mechanism to prevent further injury). This condition is called ileus and can take several days to resolve in the immediate post-operative period. During this time the patient has a very low tolerance for the intake of either liquids or solids and ileus is one of the main determinants of the length of stay in the hospital after colorectal surgery.

A metanalysis of 5 random controlled studies has found that chewing gum in the immediate postoperative period significantly shortens the length of time for the resolution of ileus by about 1/4 to 1/3 than non-gum chewing control patients. Additionally, the gum chewers were almost 20% more likely to be discharged from the hospital earlier than non-chewers without any statistical difference in complications between the two groups.

This is entirely plausible. The act of chewing normally stimulates the alimentary tract (the continuous tube from mouth to anus) to prepare it for food breakdown and digestion. It appears that chewing gum is a safe and effective (and cheap) way to shorten the recovery time after colorectal surgery.

Chewing gum also is a good way to equalize the pressure differential between the inner and outer ear during assent and decent in pressurized aircraft. But this is off topic.