Table 4 Summary of recommendations for the dietary treatment of irritable bowel syndrome

Intervention	Quality of	Benefit/	Strength of
Intervention	evidence	harm	recommendation
1. Take a careful dietary	Very low	Net benefit	Qualified
history to identify potential
causes of symptoms
2. Assess dietary fibre intake	Low	Net benefit	Qualified
and consider recommending
an increase or decrease
accordingly
3. Trial of exclusion of wheat	Low	Trade-offs	Qualified
bran or lactose	Low	Trade-offs	Qualified
4. Consider systematic modific-	Low	Trade-offs	Qualified
ation of diet to identify
intolerances