Has gall bladder removal increased since food guidelines were published?

(Gail P) #1

Lately I’ve been hearing that eating low carb, as we have been doing as a population for decades, allows or causes our gall bladders to go dormant and quit working, so that when we up our fat intake the gall bladder “attacks.”

So I wondered if gall bladder removal has trended upwards with the other health issues brought on by increased use of sugar, carbage, and packaged foods. It seems it would make sense, but don’t know how to check.

(Carl Keller) #2

Gallbladders regulate bile and one of bile’s jobs is to aid in the digestion of fatty foods so I would think that gallbladders become more important when on LCHF. That’s not to say that people without gallbladders can’t eat LCHF but it does add complications.

https://drjockers.com/following-a-ketogenic-diet-without-a-gallbladder/

There’s a lot of confliciting information about gallstones, which can become infected and cause problems in the gallbladder and often lead to their removal, but I believe most of it that advises low fat is because of fat phobia. I also believe you are correct that the SAD diet is mostly responsible for gallbladder complications.

(Gail P) #3

Thank you.
Keto news is accumulating so fast I can’t keep up any more - if I ever did.

I have no gall bladder but never had a problem with gall stones, just a couple of attacks that led to the surgery. My surgeon told me that he was 75% sure that removal would take care of my problems, so I gambled, thinking of the man up the tree with the wild cat - one of us has got to have some relief!
After surgery I heard that my gall bladder was “diseased.” It didn’t occur to me that there might be anything more to learn. I knew already that my problem was gone, although the lab results seemed to comfort the doctors.

(You've tried everything else; why not try bacon?) #4

Dr. Annette Bosworth has a video on kidney and gallstones, in which she discusses both the growth of stones on a high-carb diet, and how the stones dissolve when we start eating a ketogenic diet. She says that the problems come if the stones dissolve in such a way as to allow them to move and block a duct. People often blame the new diet, but the problem is really a holdover from the high-carb eating, and she says that the worst possible reaction to trouble with stones is to stop eating ketogenically. (The same is also true for those who suffer from gout, apparently.)