Speaker 1: Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of iHeartRadio. Hey brain Stuff,
Speaker 1: Lauren Vogel Bomb here with a classic episode from our
Speaker 1: podcasts archives. In this one, we delve into the complicated
Speaker 1: science and pseudoscience behind probiotics. This episode originally aired back
Speaker 1: in December of twenty eighteen, but probiotics is still a
Speaker 1: food and wellness industry buzzword. So what can they really do?
Speaker 1: Hey brain Stuff, Lauren Vogel bomb here. What if you
Speaker 1: could take a pill that would treat depression, constipation, diarrhea, exzema, urine,
Speaker 1: airtract infections, and allergies, while also preventing cavities and strengthening
Speaker 1: your overall immunity. And what if it promised to shield
Speaker 1: you from the impurities of the world and re establish
Speaker 1: a right and correct balance in your body's ecology. First
Speaker 1: of all, everybody settled down, there is no such thing
Speaker 1: as a pill that does all of that. But to
Speaker 1: hear some people talk, probiotics might just come close. The
Speaker 1: popularity of products containing friendly live microorganisms has exploded over
Speaker 1: the past decade. At this point, you can walk into
Speaker 1: almost any grocery store and find probiotics in capsules, lozenges, gum,
Speaker 1: facial toner and yes even in pet products, in addition
Speaker 1: to the more traditional delivery systems like culture dairy products, yogurt,
Speaker 1: and fermented products like suakraut and kombucha. Some folks are
Speaker 1: making a lot of money on these little bacterial helpers,
Speaker 1: but what are they actually able to do for us
Speaker 1: and are they safe? We spoke with doctor Chris Irwin,
Speaker 1: a dietitian and lecturer in nutrition and dietetics at Griffith
Speaker 1: University in Queensland, Australia. He said that unless you have
Speaker 1: an extremely poor diet or drink alcohol to excess, there's
Speaker 1: not a lot of evidence that a probiotic dietary supplement
Speaker 1: will help your overall health. He said, if you're taking probiotics,
Speaker 1: you'll likely need to take them every day, and it's
Speaker 1: best to feed the healthy bacteria with prebiotics. The bottom
Speaker 1: line is that healthy people are likely to get more
Speaker 1: benefit from getting regular exercise, avoiding smoking or consuming too
Speaker 1: much alcohol, and having a diet rich in foods that
Speaker 1: increase fiber and natural prebiotics intake like vegetables, fruit and
Speaker 1: whole grains, rather than consuming a probiotic supplement. However, probiotics
Speaker 1: might be an effective treatment for specific cases or conditions.
Speaker 1: While there's not a lot of evidence supporting the idea
Speaker 1: that probiotics could help with your exima allergies or dental woes, sorry,
Speaker 1: they might actually help people looking to avoid vaginal east
Speaker 1: infections or upper respiratory infections picked up from a cold virus.
Speaker 1: Other studies have found that probiotics can help with digestive
Speaker 1: issues like irritable bell syndrome and may improve the frequency
Speaker 1: and consistency of your poop. So, as a consumer, what
Speaker 1: should you look for in a probiotic If you want
Speaker 1: to get the most bang for your buck, Basically, you've
Speaker 1: got some homework to do. Irwin said. Different probiotic strains
Speaker 1: have different effects, so it's important to look for a
Speaker 1: probiotic supplement that contains the strains of bacteria most likely
Speaker 1: to match your condition. The dose of bacteria, called colon
Speaker 1: many forming units or CFU, is also important and should
Speaker 1: be high enough to meet benefits observed in clinical trials.
Speaker 1: The short answer here is, if someone is looking for
Speaker 1: a probiotic to take, go for something that provides the
Speaker 1: greatest diversity in bacterial strains and the highest CFU. Irwin
Speaker 1: also suggests getting advice from your doctor or dietitian for
Speaker 1: the strains that might be right for you, and making
Speaker 1: sure you're buying probiotic strains that are reputable and have
Speaker 1: committed to transparency in scientific research. However, that latter is
Speaker 1: more easily said than done. A study published in Jama
Speaker 1: Internal Medicine in twenty eighteen pointed out that there is
Speaker 1: very little government oversight of factories that manufacture probiotics, and
Speaker 1: the US Boon and Drug Administration, or FDA, found that
Speaker 1: about half of the six hundred and fifty factories that
Speaker 1: manufacture probiotic supplements in the United States were cited for violations,
Speaker 1: most having to do with the product not living up
Speaker 1: to what was promised on the label. The study also
Speaker 1: said the probiotics may lead to infections in people with
Speaker 1: immune deficiencies. Another study published this year in the journal
Speaker 1: Cell suggests some people may be resistant to supplemented probiotic bacteria,
Speaker 1: and therefore we'll get no benefit from it at all.
Speaker 1: The researchers also investigated whether probiotics can help the gut
Speaker 1: microbiome bounce back after a round of antibiotics, and they
Speaker 1: found that though probiotics might have helped with diarrhea related
Speaker 1: to the antibiotic. They seem to have delayed the reconstitution
Speaker 1: of gut bacteria. Of course, more research is needed to
Speaker 1: understand just how helpful probiotics are to our overall health,
Speaker 1: and it's important not to give them more credit than
Speaker 1: their due. Irwin said, it's unlikely probiotic supplements are dangerous,
Speaker 1: but I don't think that they're a magic bullet. Healthy
Speaker 1: people are likely to get more benefit from having a
Speaker 1: diet rich in vegetables, fruit, and whole grains. On the
Speaker 1: other hand, if someone has a poor diet and doesn't
Speaker 1: exercise regularly, their digestive bacteria may benefit from probiotic supplements,
Speaker 1: but they'll likely need to keep taking them to get
Speaker 1: lasting effects. Today's episode is based on the article Everyone
Speaker 1: Be Taking Probiotics on hostiff works dot com, written by
Speaker 1: Molly Edmunds and Jesslyn Shields. Brain Stuff is production of
Speaker 1: by Heart Radio in partnership with hostuffworks dot Com, and
Speaker 1: it's produced by Tyler Klang. For more podcasts from My
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.