NUTRITION - SUPPORT OR SPECIFIC THERAPY

There can be no doubt that improvement in nutrition in malnourished pa tients with Crohn's disease, whether achieved by enteral or parenteral feeding, promotes resolution of disease activity. Elemental diets, in which amino acids replace intact protein as the source of dietary nit rogen, are effective in promoting remission in patients without obviou s clinical malnutrition, but their mode of action remains controversia l, in particular, the extent to which their therapeutic benefit derive s from the elimination of dietary antigens from the gut lumen, or some other mechanism.