When I picked up my DNA Microbial Stool test (for c-diff and other 'bugs') at my doc's office, I also picked up a free sample of a high fiber gluten free bread. That bread previously was very low fiber. So I was pleased to discover that Ener-G Foods had reformulated the ingredients to make it high fiber. Ironically I didn't even look at the ingredients, because I assumed they were the same as the previous version.
I tried the bread sample and loved it. So we bought a loaf. I've eaten 3-4 sandwiches with that bread during the past month. I ALSO had more nausea, headaches, irregularity (which surprised me when I still have c-diff) and palpitations during the past few weeks. I attributed all those symptoms to c-diff recurrence.
However, last night I decided to check the price of that bread in the Ener-G Foods catalog. At the top of the catalog entry were the ingredients which listed: "filtered water, SUGAR CANE FIBER ... (and many other ingredients)" I have a diagnosed cane sugar allergy which causes reactions of nausea, palpitations (or tachycardia). Now I wonder whether eating that bread so often (about twice a week) caused the headaches and other symptoms which I attributed to c-diff recurrence????
I emailed my doc and asked whether sugar cane fiber would cause a reaction, given my cane sugar allergy. He said, "cane sugar fiber (is) part of the plant, so it should be avoided. A related example would be allergies to psyllium. Those people need to avoid psyllium fiber." WOW! That could have caused the symptoms I believed were caused by c-diff recurrence. Maybe my stool test will be negative for c-diff!!
Meanwhile I still await those DNA Microbial stool test results. The good news is my results should arrive sometime this week. I would LOVE to see a 'negative' result. So I could blame my recent symptoms on sugar cane allergy reactions. However, that won't explain the gut pain I had before I took vanco the last 3 times (2, 5 and 10 days ago). I can recover from an allergy reaction more quickly than from c-diff.
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I just wanted to share with you that I was recently diagnosed with an allergy to the mold that grows on sugar cane fibers. I was eating a high fiber bread that contained sugar cane fibers. I ended up in the ER and the hospital for 2 days. While there they diagnosed me with a lung disease called Bagassosis. As soon as I stopped eating the bread I recovered. But for four months I continued to get worse because I was eating the bread not knowing that it was making me sick.
Hi Birgitta: I'm sorry to hear about your problems with bread containing sugar cane fibers. I was diagnosed by ELISA (blood test for IgG mediated, delayed reaction allergy) with a cane sugar allergy. I usually get heart palpitations or mild tachycardia and nausea after eating cane sugar containing foods.
What were your symptoms while you were eating that bread? Which bread were you eating? (I was eating a gluten free Ener-G Foods bread.)
I 'googled' bagassosis and found that is a "A respiratory disorder caused by dust from waste sugar cane fiber". So you would need to inhale the dust of the sugar cane fiber. I wonder how that dust could be in the bread. Did you toast the bread and inhale the fumes? I also wonder whether the hospital came up with that diagnosis, because they don't know that people are allergic to cane sugar.
Anyway, I'm glad you stopped eating the bread and feel better now. Do you react to other foods which contain cane sugar? What reaction do you have to those foods?
Hi Sue,
The symptoms I had while eating the bread included being very tired and coughing a lot with sputum. That started Sept. 29. The doctors kept telling me that I had a chest cold. After three months of coughing I felt pressure on my chest and it was getting hard to breathe, so they told me that I had developed asthma and they gave me abuterol. I was eating the bread the whole time which is called Healthy Life and it is sold in our local grocery store. On January 22, it was getting harder and harder to breathe and the abuterol wasn't working, so I went to the ER and I had a red rash on my chest and back. The oxygen in my blood was in the low 70's. I was in the hospital for two days and while I was there they determined that I did not have asthma but an allergy to something. They tested my blood and the only thing I tested positive for was Bagassosis. Now I had to find out how I was getting exposed to moldy sugar cane fibers. The only thing that I had added to my life the year before was this new bread. I went to the store to look at the ingredients and there it was, "sugar cane fibers". I didn't have any of the bread at home because I had finished it the morning I went into the ER. I was toasting the bread and also eating it as sandwiches. I am not allergic to cane sugar and I'm not allergic to the fibers but to the mold that grows on them. Somehow this mold is in the bread and by eating it over and over again I developed this hypersensitivty. I live in Wisconsin, there are no other sources of moldy sugar cane fibers in my life.
Now that I have had time to reflect on the whole ordeal I realized that before the coughing started I felt bloated and I had digestion problems and low energy. I thought they were menopause symptoms, but now I am thinking that the bread didn't agree with me when I first started eating it. I started eating it in 2010, probably sometime in the summer.
The strange thing about this whole situation is that I have never been allergic to anything, ever! Now that I have stopped eating this bread I am feeling great. I am still on Flovent and if I stop taking it for a few days I start coughing up a little bit of sputum. I hope I don't have to be on Flovent for the rest of my life because of this. Stupid bread! When I got out of the hospital they had me on prednisone, advair and flovent. I talked to my primary doctor who is from Louisiana and he said that any healthy person can develop this. I wonder if others have this and don't know it. I am just so happy that my doctors caught it. Otherwise I might still be eating the bread and who knows what could have happened. Healthy Life bread sent me to the ER. Think they would like to use that as their advertising slogan? I do plan on letting the bread company know about it. I don't know if they will put a warning on the bread, but I find it hard to believe that I am the only one it has affected this way.
Sorry it took so long to get back to you. I set it up now so that any follow up comments will go to my e-mail.
Thanks.
Again I'm sorry to hear about your experience with sugar cane fiber mold. Your experience shows how seldom docs consider food allergies or even food as a cause of symptoms. I don't know whether I reacted to the 'mold' or to the sugar cane protein, to which I reacted on the ELISA allergy test. However, I'm so aware of my allergy reaction symptoms that I immediately suspected a cane sugar reaction. My reaction (palpitations and nausea) was very different from your reaction. So I'm certain I just reacted to the cane sugar protein.
I hope you told the company which makes that bread about your reaction. They may tell you that your reaction is 'rare'. However, if enough people tell them, they can no longer ignore the problems caused by that ingredient.
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