title: The Impact of a Food Elimination Diet on Collegiate Athletes' 300-meter Run Time and Concentration.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Optimal human function and performance through diet strategies are critical for everyone but especially for those involved in collegiate or professional athletics. Currently, individualized medicine (IM) is emerging as a more efficacious approach to health with emphasis on personalized diet strategies for the public and is common practice for elite athletes. One method for directing patient-specific foods in the diet, while concomitantly impacting physical performance, may be via IgG food sensitivity and Candida albicans analysis from dried blood spot (DBS) collections.
  
  
  METHODS
  The authors designed a quasi-experimental, nonrandomized, pilot study without a control group. Twenty-three participants, 15 female, 8 male, from soccer/volleyball and football athletic teams, respectively, mean age 19.64+0.86 years, were recruited for the study, which examined preposttest 300-meter run times and questionnaire responses after a 14-day IgG DBS-directed food elimination diet based on IgG reactivity to 93 foods. DBS specimen collection, 300-meter run times, and Learning Difficulties Assessment (LDA) questionnaires were collected at the participants' university athletics building on campus. IgG, C albicans, and S cerevisiae analyses were conducted at the Great Plains Laboratory, Lenexa, Kansas.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Data indicated a change in 300-meter run time but not of statistical significance (run time baseline mean=50.41 sec, run time intervention mean=50.14 sec). Descriptive statistics for frequency of responses and chi-square analysis revealed that 4 of the 23 items selected from the LDA (Listening-Memory and Concentration subscale R=.8669; Listening-Information Processing subscale R=.8517; and General Concentration and Memory subscale R=.9019) were improved posttest.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The study results did not indicate merit in eliminating foods based on IgG reactivity for affecting athletic performance (faster 300-meter run time) but did reveal potential for affecting academic qualities of listening, information processing, concentration, and memory. Further studies are warranted evaluating IgG-directed food elimination diets for improving run time, concentration, and memory among college athletes as well as among other populations.
authors.affiliation: University of Central Missouri, Warrensburg (Dr Stockton), United States.
authors.forename: Susan
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Stockton
authors.affiliation: University of Central Missouri, Warrensburg (Ms Breshears), United States.
authors.forename: Karen
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Breshears
authors.affiliation: Tennessee State University, Avon Williams Campus, Nashville (Dr Baker), United States.
authors.forename: David McA
authors.initials: DM
authors.lastname: Baker
keywords: Immunoglobulin G (IgG) food sensitivity; concentration; food elimination diet; perceived athletic ability