Doctors may prescribe chewing gum after research found it helps patients recover faster from bowel operations.

People who had bowel surgery were able to go home nearly two days earlier if they were given the sweet treat. If the patient chewed for 30 minutes in the morning, afternoon and night the chewing action triggered their gastric hormones. In turn the bowel was stimulated allowing the patient to resume normal eating.

Consultant nurse Harriet Wright led the six-month study of 67 bowel patients at Dorset County Hospital in Dorchester.

She said: "Patients who received normal care went home four or five days after surgery. But those who chewed the gum went home an average of one-and-a-half days earlier. Gum gets patients better and home quicker. We now recommend it after surgery to help bowels to recover quicker. Hopefully this will become practice now."

But I chew my way through mountains of gum and my bowels are knackered...

Remember people...DO NOT SWALLOW!

The original was here.