Obesity Abstracts

Background: The prevalence of obesity is rising globally among children and adults. Obesity accounts for significant morbidity, mortality and complicates chronic health conditions such as hypertension, several types of cancers and liver disease. Adipose accumulation is a reliable indicator of obesity. One approach to reducing adipose accumulation is lipase inhibition in the form of medication (Orlistat). However, the use of this drug is associated with adverse gastrointestinal side effects. There is evidence that brown seaweed and its extracted alginic acid and its salts can inhibit lipase. Thus, these could be explored as suitable options for obesity prevention.

Objective: The purpose of this study was to examine if the addition of alginate in pork sausage affected the acceptability and palatability. The second aim was to determine whether eating alginate pork sausage as a part of daily food contribute to GI well-being.

Design: A total of 35 participants (18 male and 17 female between 18 and 64 years of age), generally healthy without any chronic health conditions, non-smoker included a novel alginate sausage into their normal diet had completed the study. These participants kept a food diary and completed a GI well-being questionnaire at the end of each day and once at the end of each study week during four weeks of the study. They consumed their normal diet in the first and third week and ate both control and alginate sausages in the second and fourth week. The first type of sausage was separated by a 1 week washout period.

Results: We demonstrated that alginate pork sausage had no adverse well-being symptoms on the participants. There was no significant correlation between consumption of alginate complemented pork sausage or control pork sausage on the daily average amount of nutrients consumed in calories, fat, fibre, protein, carbohydrate, sodium and sugar. Thus indicating acceptability of alginate pork sausage.

Conclusion: It is clear that both alginate and control pork sausages had no impact on the health of gastrointestinal well-being.

Keywords: Obesity, gastrointestinal (GI), alginate, pancreatic lipase.