effect of a short-term physical activity after meals on gastrointestinal symptoms in individuals with functional abdominal bloating; a randomized clinical trial

Introduction: abdominal bloating imposes significant clinical and social and economic burden on the healthcare systems; however, treatment of bloating is limited and not effective in all individuals with this symptom. Prokinetic agents are one of those treatments recommended to be used in the treatment of bloating in individuals without underlying disorders traditionally. The present study aims to compare the effect of a short duration postprandial walking and prokinetic medications on bloating reported by healthy individuals. Methods: the study participants were randomized into two groups of control and intervention. In control group, individuals were given daily domperidone plus activated dimethicone as a prokinetic medication. While, the subjects in the intervention group were asked to perform a 10-15 minutes of walking after each meal. The study duration was 4 weeks and afterwards the subjects were visited again and their symptoms before and after study was compared. Results: This study consists of 94 individuals including 24 men and 70 women with mean age of 44.47 ± 12.25 years with 49 participants in control group and 45 participants in the intervention group. Both prokinetic medication use and minimal exercise after meals were associated with significant improvements in the GI tract symptoms such as belching, flatus, postprandial epigastric fullness/ bloating, gas incontinency and abdominal discomfort/pain (p-value <0.001). The changes in the score of the gastrointestinal symptoms from beginning to end of study between the two arms of study were not statistically significant except for postprandial epigastric fullness/ bloating symptoms that the intervention was superior to the control product(p-value=0.002). Conclusion: this study shows that physical activity could be considered for relieve of abdominal bloating symptoms. In contrast to other means of treatment proposed for abdominal bloating and its related symptoms, this one needs no materials or equipment and can be performed easily by any individual.