Kyle (1968)
p. 137: 'Out of the complete series, 91 patients (44 per cent) remained well and free from colonic symptoms for at least 5 years'. The figure of 44 per cent is the one which we have quoted.
Zollinger (1968) p. 420: 'There were only 69 patients (30 per cent) who were living and well with no subjective symptoms of any kind. There were 17 individuals (8 per cent) who were living with diseases other than diverticulitis'. In other words 38 per cent were symptom-free at follow-up, as quoted in our paper. Parks and Connell(1970) p. 776 '121 patients (58 per cent) were symptom-free'. We suspect Mr Ornstein and colleagues have quoted from another paper by Parks-1969 (I).
- Numerous studies have reported the,value of high fibre diet and bran in the treatment and allenauon of symptoms in diverticular disease (2-4). It may be that Mr Ornstein and his colleagues failed to notice any symptomatic improvement because the period of their study (16 weeks) was not long enough. We have followed patients with symptomatic diverticular disease for over 1 year and noted improvements in several objective parameters, including transit time and percentage motility as well as abnormal myoelectrical patterns (4, 5).