Why Did the People Drink Their Own Blood?

Sailender05 May, 2021Health

It wasn't to study vampirism. Instead, in a study published in August of 2018 in the United European Gastroenterology Journal, researchers had participants drink their own blood to identify better ways to monitor symptoms of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), which includes Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis. In this unusual experiment, researchers asked 16 healthy participants to drink either 3 ounces (100 millimeters) or 10 ounces (300 ml) of their own blood. One month later, the participants came back and switched groups. After each quaff, the researchers measured the participants' levels of a protein called calprotectin, which can indicate intestinal inflammation when present at higher levels in stool samples. But gastrointestinal bleeding may also be responsible for high levels of fecal calprotectin, which can make it hard for doctors to distinguish the cause of a positive test in people with IBD.