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  • Probiotics: Solving Poor Digestive Health

    Probiotics: Solving Poor Digestive Health

    Bacteria are at the base of each person’s digestive health. There are good and bad bacterias, diverse and undiverse gut microbiomes, and thousands of factors that produce each. Today lots of people have weak digestive systems, as many as 72% of Americans experience digestive distress symptoms regularly. 

    Our Digestive Systems Need Help

    So what does that look like? There are obvious factors such as upset stomachs, diarrhea, and constipation. Although there are less obvious factors like bloating, heartburn, rapid weight fluctuation without a notable cause. Pushed far enough a negative digestive system will even start to lead to disease and illness.

    In understanding how to solve any of these potential symptoms, it’s important to understand where they come from. Each person has a gut microbiome. This is a system where trillions of bacteria work to process and digest all that enters the body. It’s when this system is compromised that problems start to arise.

    This typically comes from a lack of good or a lack of diverse bacteria entering the gut. Overly processed, sugary, and pesticide-treated foods tend to produce negative bacteria. This makes it harder for more diverse bacteria to grow. A lack of movement, lack of sunshine, or obvious factors like illness also all work to do the same. 

    Solutions for Digestive Health

    This makes the solutions to digestive problems seem fairly simple, and luckily, they are. Put the time and effort into eating healthy, unprocessed foods, working out, spending time outside. These will all start to improve the gut microbiome. These are the same solutions to just about every health issue though, and they’re not always the easiest to achieve.

    Regardless of if someone is working too much, can’t afford high quality food, maybe even has a long-term illness, there are many reasons it can be hard to live a positive lifestyle. It’s important to always be working towards these lifestyle solutions, but sometimes supplements and more practical solutions can also be helpful.

    The Role of Probiotics

    Probiotics are the most useful of the more direct and less lifestyle based solutions. Probiotics are bacteria that will enter the microbiome of a person and colonize the digestive tract to produce more positive and diverse bacteria. These are naturally found in fermented foods like cheese, yogurt, and kombucha, but they’re also now being made into more effective supplements.

    These supplements will strengthen the immune system, reduce inflammation, stop the growth of negative bacteria, stimulate positive bacteria, and effectively interact with every part of the body. They’re shown to be effective in reducing several forms of diarrhea, clostridium difficile infections, and all the day to day digestive issues people tend to feel.

    Probiotics supplements also have promising evidence showing that they can help in the treatment of allergies, metabolic disorders, respiratory tract infections, and UTI’s. The overarching health effects of a strong digestive system are even predicted to help with depression and chemotherapy. 

    In Closing

    Probiotics are not perfect or immutable. They affect everyone differently, can be dangerous to those who are immunocompromised, and should not be used as an excuse to live and eat unhealthily. Instead, they should be used to promote long term health and positive internal systems. Digestive issues are widespread in the modern world and the means to solving those solutions need to be understood.

    Do Probiotics Really Work?: Why Probiotics are Necessary
    Source: Nouri


  • Probiotics Used To Inhibit Weight Gain: Study

    Researchers at Vanderbilt University have utilized bacteria that produce a therapeutic compound in the gut to inhibit weight gain, insulin resistance, and other negative effects of a high-fat diet in mice, according to redOrbit.

    The team used a safe bacterial strain called E. coli Nissle 1917, which has been used as probiotic treatment for diarrhea since its discovery nearly 100 years ago.

    They genetically modified the strain to produce a liquid compound called NAPE, which is normally synthesized in the small intestine in response to feeding. NAPE is rapidly converted to NAE, a compound that reduces both food intake and weight gain.

    “NAPE seemed like a great compound to try — since it’s something that the host normally produces,” senior researcher Sean Davies said.

    The researchers added NAPE-producing bacteria to the drinking water of a group of mice that ate a high-fat diet for eight weeks. Mice that received the NAPE-producing bacteria had lower food intake, body fat, insulin resistance, and fatty liver when compared to a group of mice receiving the control bacteria.

    Researchers found that the protective effects of the NAPE-producing bacteria lasted for as long as four weeks after the bacteria was removed from the drinking water. And even after 12 weeks, the mice that received the NAPE-producing bacteria strain had much lower body weight and body fat when compared to the control mice.

    “We still haven’t achieved our ultimate goal, which would be to do one treatment and then never have to administer the bacteria again,” Davies said. “Six weeks is pretty long to have active bacteria, and the animals are still less obese 12 weeks out.

    “This paper provides a proof of concept. Clearly, we can get enough bacteria to persist in the gut and have a sustained effect. We would like for that effect to last longer.”

    Davies has had a long-standing interest in using probiotic bacteria to deliver drugs to the gut in a sustained manner, eliminating the need for pharmaceutical drugs that treat chronic illnesses. In 2007, he received a National Institutes of Health Director’s New Innovator Award to pursue his idea.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Probiotics Benefits May Include Healthier Skin

    Some early studies suggest that consuming probiotics in food or dietary supplements might help or prevent certain skin conditions, according to LiveScience.

    The benefit of consuming probiotics is that they introduce healthy bacteria into the gut, reducing inflammation, which causes a variety of skin conditions, said Dr. Whitney Bowe, a clinical assistant professor of dermatology at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City.

    According to Bowe, probiotics hold promise for treating common skin conditions such as acne and rosacea. Several manufacturers are currently experimenting with adding strains of probiotics to their skin care products, including moisturizers, cleansers, peels and lotions. The four skin conditions that seem most promising for probiotics to treat are acne, eczema, rosacea, and anti-aging.

    But according to another article in LiveScience, people still have misconceptions about the use of probiotics, their benefits, and their role in promoting health and treating diseases, said Dr. Patricia Hibberd, a professor of pediatrics and chief of global health at MassGeneral Hospital for Children in Boston, who has studied probiotics in young children and older adults.

    The article goes on to say that not all probiotics are the same, that they cannot replace medication, and that food and supplement labels do not provide an accurate microbe count for the specific probiotic they contain.

    According to WebMD, “Probiotics are bacteria that help maintain the natural balance of organisms (microflora) in the intestines. The normal human digestive tract contains about 400 types of probiotic bacteria that reduce the growth of harmful bacteria and promote a healthy digestive system.”

    Part of the problem, according to Hibberd, is the way probiotics are advertised. None of the supplements or foods that contain probiotics is approved to treat specific diseases or conditions but general health claims are allowed to be made. Food makers are allowed to say that their product “improves digestive health,” a very general claim that’s not well-defined.

    Still, Bowe believes that early research is showing some compelling results for probiotic treatment of skin conditions. Increased numbers of good bacteria may also help to hydrate aging skin, reduce sun damage and improve the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles, Bowe suggests.

    Image via Wikimedia Commons

  • Probiotics: Not As Beneficial As You Might Think

    Probiotics are the good, positive bacteria inside our bodies that help with digestion. For a bacteria to be considered “probiotic,” there needs to be evidence of its health benefits when taken in adequate amounts. “Digestive health is really the only core benefit of many probiotics,” says Mary Ellen Sanders, a food science researcher who spends time examining probiotics. Many probiotic products claim to support other areas in the body, including brain function and the immune system. And there’s really no evidence that supports that claim.

    “Because the effects of probiotics vary broadly, and immune-system effects are incredibly diverse, immune-system boost should not be considered a core benefit of probiotics,” Sanders said. Even if a bacteria strand has the potential to offer health benefits, many companies label their food as “probiotic” without any supporting research or evidence. The largest two examples of false probiotic claims are in yogurts and fermented foods.

    “There’s much folklore around the health benefits of fermented food,” Sanders told Live Science. “Blue cheese may have lots of really neat microbes in it, but you can’t call it a probiotic until research shows there is a benefit associated with it.”

    This is also the case with yogurt, whose natural probiotics die during the pasteurization process. Brands that want to keep the “probiotic” label on their yogurt add live cultures such as Lactobacilli and Bifidobacteria. “Those organisms are added because they actually have the benefit of surviving the intestinal transit, so they can make it into your colon,” Saunders said. It is only these yogurts that have true “probiotic” value.

    So what do companies need to do before they claim their product contains “probiotics?” “You can’t do a fairy-dust approach here; it has to be in suitable quantity to have health benefits. Probiotics require that the organism be alive, and be substantiated to have a health benefit,” Sanders said.

    Next time you go out shopping for probiotic foods, check to make sure there are a significant amount of live active cultures, or else you’re not really doing your body any favors.

    Image via ThinkStock

  • Probiotic Supplements: Accelerating Weight Loss

    A recent test that was conducted in Canada has found that probiotic supplements helped women lose weight, and keep it off. Although the test was performed on both men and women, it appears that only the women lost the weight.

    The test was conducted at Laval University in Quebec City, Canada, where they tested 125 overweight men and women, who were put through a 12-week weight loss diet. After the diet period, a 12-week maintenance program was included in the total 24-week program.

    During the program, half of the men and women took two capsules daily of one strain of probiotic bacteria, Lactobacillus rhamnosus. The other half took placebos.

    What was most interesting is that the women were the only ones that the probiotic helped in the weight loss efforts. Researchers believe it could have to do with the type or strain used in the test, which may not effect men in regard to losing or gaining weight.

    The results showed that even though all participants lost weight after the first part of the program, only the women who took the probiotic lost more weight than the others. And, during the maintenance portion, the women who took the probiotics continued losing weight, while the men and women not on the capsules, just maintained or gained.

    So, the women in the probiotics group lost nearly twice as much weight overall on average. What’s more, women in the probiotic group also saw a 25 percent drop in their blood levels of leptin, a hormone that seems to be a key player in regulating appetite and metabolism.

    However, the researchers were somewhat puzzled about the gender differences in the test and why the men didn’t benefit from the probiotics.

    Curiously, they used only used one probiotic strain, while other probiotic supplements may contain 14 strains. And fermented foods and beverages can contain even more. So the one strain may have not been effective on males due to the different intestinal bacteria and flora in men. But the strain certainly worked on women.

    “We don’t know why the probiotics didn’t have any effect on men. It may be a question of dosage, or the study period may have been too short,” Angelo Tremblay, an obesity researcher a Laval who led the research, said in a statement.

    It is possible that this one probiotic worked for half of the women who took it, but with the positive affects to only women and not men, it might not work for everyone.

    But, a healthy diet that includes a lot of fresh fruit and veggies can help tremendously when battling weight, especially if they replace those burgers and fries.

    Image via YouTube