Neurocognitive responses of patients with CD to visual food cues
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Neurocognitive responses of patients with active and inactive Crohn’s disease to visual food cues in hunger and satiety
IRAS ID
270271
Contact name
Jimmy Limdi
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 8 months, 30 days
Research summary
The relationship between Crohn's disease (CD) and appetite is complex. Decreased appetite, particularly in active disease, is likely to be multifactorial involving unpleasant food-related symptoms, hormonal changes and psychosocial factors. Decreased appetite in CD is associated with decreased oral intake thus risking weight loss, nutritional deficiencies and overall decreased quality of life. The role of neurocognitive mechanisms driving the motivational attractiveness of food cues in patients with CD have not been widely studied.
Visual food cues evoke a wide range of physiological, emotional and cognitive responses, including the preparation of the body for subsequent food consumption, higher desire to eat, memory retrieval, hedonic evaluation and possibly self-regulation feelings. Neurocognitive testing constitutes a commonly used technique to examine differences in neural brain responses relative to eating behaviour in a completely non-invasive way using computer based tasks.
In the healthy population neurocognitive tasks demonstrate that participants are quicker to approach palatable food stimuli than they are to avoid them. There is also evidence that, in the fasted state, response times are quicker in neurocognitive tasks involving food cues. To our knowledge no studies exist examining the performance of CD patients in these neurocognitive tasks involving food stimuli.
This study therefore aims to assess patients with active and inactive ileal or ileocolonic CD on a battery of neurocognitive tasks involving food cues in both the fasted and fed state.
It is anticipated that patients with active CD, who experience unpleasant food related stimuli, may not show such an attentional bias towards food stimuli in the fasted state compared to those patients with inactive, asymptomatic disease. We hope this will shed further light on the complex nature of appetite, oral intake and weight loss in patients with active CD and guide further research in this highly important area in the future.
REC name
North West - Greater Manchester West Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
19/NW/0640
Date of REC Opinion
10 Oct 2019
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion