Functional gut & digestive disorders, IBS and SIBO

Poor gut health has become increasingly recognised as a key contributor to poor general health, and disease. Moreover, optimal gut health is becoming accepted as a key aspect of whole-body optimal health. For women particularly, poor gut health can be an important contributor to hormonal imbalance, because poor gut health can greatly disrupt normal hormone metabolism/detoxification.

All Dr Hale’s consultations involve a thorough history of gut symptoms and if appropriate, targeted investigations to exclude dysfunctional bowel problems such as poor digestion, poor absorption, dysbiosis and small intestine bacterial (or fungal) overgrowth, also called SIBO (or SIFO).

Dr. Hale says, “In my training as an internal medicine specialist, there was little information about functional gut disorders. We did learn to appreciate the connection between anxiety /stress and functional bowel disorders, especially abdominal pain. However, we weren’t taught the details or the importance of ‘the adverse health effects’ of poor digestion, food intolerance, or poor gut motility, especially small bowel motility. It has taken me some years to grasp the most appropriate diagnostic process to investigate functional gut disorders and the many ways in which poor gut function can cause illness and debilitating symptoms.”