I first joined this website back in March. I answered a question that somone asked about stress causing UC. (3.07.07)I brought up that stress can cause your bacteria level to change. Well, Mr. Kangaroo Roger shot me down. I did start a few discussions about "probiotics". If you don't have a chance to get the new issue of Reader's Digest (June '07) Here in black & white was what I was tryingtrying to explain that day. Here is a condensed version....."while harmful bacteria hate your guts, probiotic bacteria love your guts. Those in your belly live in a complex ecological equilibrium with other bacteria and help keep harmful ones from growing.Many forces can throw off this delicate balance.Among them:aging, alcohol, poor diet, chronic illness and possibly even stress. (this was where I mentioned a type of bacteria that thrive on acidic conditions, when we are stressed this enviorment can be perfect breeding ground for such bad types of bacteria. Mr. Kangroo Roger took that opportunity to tell the world how wrong I was)Antibiotics are particulary troublesome. They destroy many of the beneficial bacteria on the way to killing the disease causing ones they're prescribed to treat. When the balance in the digestive tract is disrupted, some of the harmful bacteria can grow too numerous, like weeds taking over a lawn, and cause intestinal distress, diarrhea and worse. Probiotics (this was where I mentioned that if I knew this before my UC and ate my way through Dannon Yogurt I probably wouldn't have had my J pouch)may help restore equilibrium. They are found in foods like yogurt and in dietary supplements that contain various strains of Lactobacillusand Bifidobacteriumamong others...." as per this article in this month's issue of RD. (page #71 "Food For Life" by- Dr. Dean Ornish, MD

While I'm very skeptical about stress being the true cause of this disease, I definitely view it as a catalyst ("the straw that broke the camel's back"). Medical research and guidance has confirmed the detrimental effects of stress on one's body. I have to agree that stress is very likely to upset the delicate balance of your intestinal flora. Both of my bouts with UC, prior to J-pouch, were accompanied by stressful times. Stress can also do a lot more than help perpetrate dysbiosis. Stress kills. Maybe not in an instant, but the effects are cumulative (chronic stress), and if you don't find a way to effectively mitigate it, it will systematically cause harm. One would have to be foolish not to believe in the influence of mind-body connections and the relation to disease, especially insults like UC. Additionally, for those that believe in the efficacy of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM), the train of thought is that UC is a constitutional disease.

While it may be intriguing to romanticize how Dannon Yogurt or probiotics in general might have saved your colon, it is not productive. I did that for a short period of time. There is no certainty that it would have changed the course of the disease. What's done is done. We all need to move forward.

Eating yogurt and taking probiotic supplements may be helpful in health maintenance, but there has been no real evidence that you can treat severely active UC in any meaningful way with them. I have read study after study on this and the only constant is that it does not work to try to induce a remission of UC when the inflammation was severe. However, for mild or moderate disease, it can be useful (the probiotics, not the yogurt). As far as UC prevention goes, I don't know. Who would know that they were going to get it and should eat a lot of yogurt and probiotics before the UC hits?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?db=pubmed...&itool=pubmed_docsum

There has been extensive discussion on this board regarding probiotics and the usefulness of them in maintaining a healthy gut, so I don't think anyone has tried to disspell that notion. Some people have found some modest results in treatment of pouchitis type symptoms too. People with IBD apparently tend to have altered microflora balances, and that is one theory as to how IBD progresses. There are certain links in the chain that need to be present for IBD to manifest, and a lack of probiotic bacteria may be one of them. My understanding is that there is not enough probiotics in any yogurt product to really make any real difference for someone with IBD, and you would have to take the concentrated pill or other supplement form to see a real affect. In addition, the probiotics in yogurt probably do not survive the stomach acid.

Plus, I think it is a fairly widely accepted notion that prolonged and extreme stress takes its toll on the body in many ways, including the gut. But, mild stress actually appears to be healthy for most people, not disease provoking. Just living life is stress, so there is no getting out of it. Now, what your response to stress is, that may be another issue.

The article cited in Reader's Digest is fine, but it is very vague as to the applications of probiotics for IBD, basically saying that they may be helpful.

Here is a link to that Reader's Digest article for those who are interested:
http://www.rd.com/content/these-bugs-make-you-better/0/

Jan

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Jan Dollar,

Jan, excellent points.

Would it be worthwhile to start our (healthy) children on probiotics? Infant formula with probiotics and kids' probiotic supplements are being heavily marketed in Australia at the moment.

Well, there is some evidence that probiotics are good for kids and even infants. Some studies showed that probiotics may help prevent antibiotic associated diarrhea in children.
http://www.webmd.com/digestive-disorders/news/20070420/...y-curb-kids-diarrhea

Other studies indicate there may be some use of yogurt in other diseases such as asthma. It's still too soon to tell, but there certainly isn't anything wrong about encouraging healthy eating at an early age.
http://www.drgreene.com/21_1697.html

Jan