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- Spicy Food Off the Hook as Ulcer Cause--But Is It a Cure?
by Dave DeWitt
Are chiles a cause of ulcers or a cure for them? For centuries, there have been two schools of thought on the subject. The first holds that chiles produce excess stomach acid, which eats holes in the wall of the stomach and duodenum. This is why spicy diets have long been forbidden for ulcer sufferers. The other school of thought holds that the capsaicin in chiles has the power to cure ulcers.
Now, thanks to new discoveries about the origin of ulcers, scientists are leaning toward the second school of thought. This is because the source of these ulcers has now been traced to the bacterium Helicobacter pylori, which lives in the lining of the stomach wall and migrates down to the duodenum. Half of adults older than age 60 have the bacterium in their body, but only a very small percentage of them develop ulcers. The reason the bacterium selectively causes ulcers is not known, but the method of attack is theorized to be two-pronged. First, the bacterium attacks the stomach wall and causes an perforation, or ulcer. Then the bacterium seems to stimulate the production of hydrochloric acid and pepsin, a digestive enzyme, and this combination causes the pain.
"It turns out that diet has absolutely nothing to do with ulcers," says Dr. Robert Ganz, a Minneapolis gastroenterologist. "Alcohol has nothing to do with ulcers. Smoking probably has nothing to do with ulcers." And they have nothing to do with stress, coffee, or fried food. A mystery, though, is why ulcers are more common among people in lower socioeconomic levels.
Fortunately, H. pylori can be destroyed with a two or three week treatment of various antibiotics combined with antacid drugs such as Zantac. Medical researchers are even working on a vaccine. But what about chiles as a treatment for ulcers?
At first such a cure sounds horrible, like placing cayenne powder on an open wound. But that is precisely what cayenne is used for in herbal medicine. The capsaicin in the powder has antibacterial properties; this has been demonstrated with Tabasco sauce killing the bacteria present in raw oysters. It also fights pain after the initial burning, which is why the capsaicin creams relieve arthritis pain.
In folk medicine, chiles have long been reputed to heal ulcers. "Cayenne rebuilds the tissue in the stomach and heals stomach and intestinal ulcers," wrote Diane Robertson in Jamaican Herbs (1982). Her view is upheld by Bolivian Indians who suffer from stomach ulcers. In what is probably an extremely painful treatment, the ulcerous patients are fed fresh rocoto chiles (Capsicum pubescens), one of the hottest varieties in the world. For fourteen to eighteen days, patients are fed the chiles, beginning with one the first day, two the second day, and so on until they are cured. It is difficult to imagine anyone consuming eighteen of these chiles raw in a single day. That would probably result in a severe case of rocoto-proctitis. However, the concept of high dosages of capsaicin to fight high infections of bacteria is not that far-fetched. But what about the pain? Most people who consume large quantities of chiles don't have stomach pain--and they don't have ulcers, either.
Herbalists strongly believe that cayenne can cure ulcers. Dr. Daniel Mowrey, author of The Scientific Validation of Herbal Medicine, writes: "Ulcers, even the ulcers with the H. pylori, don't stand a chance. Cayenne kills the bacterium and heals ulcers by stimulating the mucous lining of the stomach. Eventually new tissue develops without interfering with the stomach's ability to absorb nutrients."
Scientific studies, however, have shown mixed results. One 1985 study cited in the British Medical Journal reported: "Red chiles were found not to influence the healing of the duodenal ulcer." This was a four-week study where ulcer sufferers were fed a dosage of three grams of red chile powder a day." However, that study and numerous others proved that capsaicin does not damage the gastic mucosa, as was previously thought. Another study, with rats in Singapore, indicated that capsaicin does inhibit ulcers. Researchers therorize that capsaicin triggers gastric nerves to release calcitonin gene-related peptide, which boosts blood flow.
As is typical in many medical questions, the experts disagree about the effectiveness of chile on ulcers. However, anecdotal evidence continues to indicate that there are fewer ulcers in populations that consume high amounts of chiles. In Singapore, for example, ulcers are three times more prevalent in the Chinese community, which consumes mild food, than in the Indian and Malay communities, which crave the hot stuff.