nutrients Review Diet and Nutrients in Gastrointestinal Chronic Diseases Antonio Corsello 1,* , Daniela Pugliese 1, Antonio Gasbarrini 1,2 and Alessandro Armuzzi 1,2 1 OU Internal Medicine and Gastroenterology, Fondazione Policlinico Universitario A. Gemelli IRCCS, 00168 Rome, Italy;
[email protected] (D.P.);
[email protected] (A.G.);
[email protected] (A.A.) 2 Istituto di Patologia Speciale Medica, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Largo F. Vito 1, 00168 Rome, Italy * Correspondence:
[email protected]; Tel.: +39-380-381-0206 Received: 15 July 2020; Accepted: 1 September 2020; Published: 3 September 2020 Abstract: Diet and nutrition are known to play key roles in many chronic gastrointestinal diseases, regarding both pathogenesis and therapeutic possibilities. A strong correlation between symptomatology, disease activity and eating habits has been observed in many common diseases, both organic and functional, such as inflammatory bowel disease and irritable bowel syndrome. New different dietary approaches have been evaluated in order improve patients’ symptoms, modulating the type of sugars ingested, the daily amount of fats or the kind of metabolites produced in gut. Even if many clinical studies have been conducted to fully understand the impact of nutrition on the progression of disease, more studies are needed to test the most promising approaches for different diseases, in order to define useful guidelines for patients. Keywords: nutrition; gastrointestinal diseases; pediatrics; feeding disorders; functional gastrointestinal disorders; enteral nutrition; inflammatory bowel disease; irritable bowel syndrome 1. Introduction Nutrition and its various facets play a fundamental role in the development and growth of the individual, both directly and indirectly modifying all physiological phenomena during the course of life [1].