What is best wide-range PROBIOTIC to buy after SIBO treatment ?

[Bansaw]

My doctor wants to put me on a SIBO treatment, and afterwards she wants me to go heavy for a while on Probiotics.
What commercial probiotic product do you recommend?

I was looking at Garden of Life, 100Billion. It looks to me basically like dried kefir.

I might actually do kefir with raw milk and mix some fruit in there and RS too.
I think there is a trillion cfus in a cup of kefir, and about 30 strains. But I am also thinking about a commercial product too.
I was looking into ones that contain soil bacteria but I read they simply perform their task and pass straight through. They don't colonize.

 

[Richard7]

Bansaw I would suggest that you look at these links

http://www.vegetablepharm.blogspot.com.au/p/dietary-fiber-info.html

http://drbganimalpharm.blogspot.de/2014/09/dont-take-resistant-starch-alone-and.html

and http://www.drmyhill.co.uk/wiki/Fermentation_in_the_gut_and_CFS

http://drbganimalpharm.blogspot.de/2013/11/how-to-cure-sibo-small-intestinal-bowel_10.html

http://coolinginflammation.blogspot.com.au/2014/03/health-in-diagrams-i-gut-flora-and-diet.html


Its a big topic and takes a long time to understand, and its not as if everyone agrees of knows the "Truth" if there is one. Kind of like CFS.


I tried taking isolated fibre with the commercial probiotics recommended on the animalpharm site.


I really did not like raw potato starch, I tried it for a while based on everyone else's opinions and found that it made me worse. And I was taking it with green banana flour, acaia gum, psyllium etc. So I was not doing it in the worst way, the way that Animalpharm now advises against.


I also had a problem with one of those 10 strain probiotics that made me extremely photophobic for a couple of weeks: which was how long it took me to realise that I should I stop taking it.


My take away is to listen to yourself. Try things but don't keep taking anything that makes you feel worse.


I have found that what worked best for me is eating a diet which contains kombucha, beet kvass, fermented veges and foods that provide a large range of different types of fibre.


I roast a lot of vegetables at one time then cool them in the fridge to produce RS3. I then eat them with lots of greens and other cooked or raw vegetables in salads or added to soups/stews over the next few days.


I have some sort of fermented drink every day and eat fermented veges most days.


But I also have days where I cannot handle greens, or just want a kilo of raw carrots, or dates or something.


In the absence of perfect knowledge, I don't force myself to do things that I really don't want to do, and follow my strange whims.


The only isolated "fibre" I take is lactose, because though I cannot tolerate dairy at the moment (presumably the casein) I hope I will be able to in the future and I do not want to loose my lactase producing bacteria. It also is something I like, but only at about .5 - 1tsp per day.


Coming back from SIBO I have had to be careful about food intolerances, avoiding foods for a while and then retesting them.

And some of the reactions have been really bad, retesting hazelnuts and almonds was hell. As were chickpeas about 8 months ago but I retested them last month and now I can eat them.


I would also suggest that you might want to slowly increase the amount of fibre you eat. A quick increase can lead to a lot of gas, which can be painful and disturb your sleep.

I hear an interview with Terry Wahls in which she reccomended that people start with cooked and pureed foods, then cooked foods, then fermented foods etc.

You may also want to look into stomach acid. Myhill writes about this. But the stomach acid is meant to stop SIBO from happening. I had low stomach acid, which lead to reflux, which lead to my doctor giving my an H2 inhibitor to reduce my stomach acid!

I now take betaine hcl, and that seems to have improved things a lot.

I drink the pickle juice and fermented drinks between meals so that their probiotics are not killed by the acid.

I liked some of the commercial probiotics, I particularly liked http://www.iherb.com/O-Donnell-Formulas-Flora-Balance-Flora-Balance-60-Capsules/6078 and http://www.iherb.com/Advanced-Ortho...atural-Probiotic-Formula-90-Veggie-Caps/43463


The multi strains are probably not as interesting as your kefir, or some fermented veges which will bring a whole range of wild bacteria.


If you are not into the fermented vegetables I suggest you look into Sandor Katz http://www.wildfermentation.com/ . I prefer to do my ferments in fido or le parfait jars, but Katz is a wonderful resource. I watched several of his lessons/talks on fermentation on youtube, and also bought one of his books .

I really hope this helps.

 

[Bansaw]

I really hope this helps.

Thanks, that was helpful. The one you bought at iherb, the Bacillus Laeterosporus, - its says its a transitory bacteria. But then the description by the manufacturer says it will "populate" the gut.
As with soil bacteria in general I thought they are transitory and they just do their job in the gut and pass straight out. They do not populate. Whats your take on that?

 

[Richard7]

Thanks, that was helpful. The one you bought at iherb, the Bacillus Laeterosporus, - its says its a transitory bacteria. But then the description by the manufacturer says it will "populate" the gut.
As with soil bacteria in general I thought they are transitory and they just do their job in the gut and pass straight out. They do not populate. Whats your take on that?

I don't see that as a problem.

Art Ayres makes the point that the transient species fulfill some of the duties of missing bacteria in a gut with disbiosis.

And transient maybe quiet a long time. I cannot remember the source but I read a summary of some research on bacillus subtillus, which is in traditionally fermented korean bean paste and japanese nato. It survives in the gut for weeks (i cannot remeber how many) but koreans eat about 10g of bean paste on a typical day. In those parts of eastern Japan where it is traditional, Nato is generally eaten once a week. It would be the same with eastern european eaters of yoghurt or kefir.

If you eat them once they are transient, if they are a part of your diet they are habitual residents.

I understand the laterosporus is meant to help deal with candida - which was an issue for me. If you take antibiotics, you knock the bacteria out but leave the fungi standing which changes the balance of the ecosystem.

But my liking for these two was a gut feeling. After I had been taking them for a while I found that I preferred them to the O'Donnels acidophilus for example (which I really did not like) or the prescript assist (which I was indifferent to). I also really liked ethhical nutrients inner health plus http://www.ethicalnutrients.com.au/Products/product?groupkey=IHC .

 

[Kathevans]

After being treated with xifaxan two years ago, I followed up with a probiotic I'd been taking previously, HMF Forte. I took it because I tolerated it, nothing more. It's primarily lactobacillus and bifidus, I believe. And I continued to eat fermented sauerkraut that a company called Real Pickles in Western MA makes, which is terrific. At the time I knew nothing about any gut protocols other than the familiar candida diet. A year and a half on I began to develop a lot of pain, after ingesting an admittedly high oxalate diet for a long time--Swiss Chard, lots of nuts, sweet potatoes--and tested very high for oxalates. So--I've been on a low to medium oxalate diet for about six months now.

Unfortunately, I can't say how much it's helped because I also had a lot of B-12 and folate issues that I'm currently working on. Sorry about that! I just meant this as a heads up about what you eat after having SIBO treatment and before you actually rebuild the good gut bacteria.

Antibiotics kill oxalobacter formigenes, I think it's called, the naturally occurring oxalate digester in our guts. No gastroenterologist is going to tell you that...

I had the low stomach acid/reflux conundrum @Richard7 mentions and took zantac at a low nightly dose for 8 years. That was probably the beginning of many of my problems. I've used sea salt and lemon juice with meals to help raise acid levels and am about to buy some betaine with digestive enzymes to further heal the mess that medication (other antibiotics, too) made of my gut.