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Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

theguardian.com

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Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#21

Post by Mountain_Skies »

spfzero wrote: post #17

Wouldn't an easier way to do this be to control diet? For one thing, it slows the process of change down which would ease any shock-related side-effects. Of course, it takes a lot of work from the patient to adhere, but if they are at the point that they are considering fecal transplant, they're probably ready. This also gives the biome a chance to adapt to anything particular about the individual, if possible (certa…

You're probably correct that keeping the same diet could kill off the transplanted biome but a better diet can't necessarily improve the gut biome if desired microbes have gone extinct in that person. And there are likely cases where a person had the proper diet but some of their gut biome was destroyed by some other factor like a broad-spectrum antibiotic.

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#22

Post by manmal »

spfzero wrote: post #17

Wouldn't an easier way to do this be to control diet? For one thing, it slows the process of change down which would ease any shock-related side-effects. Of course, it takes a lot of work from the patient to adhere, but if they are at the point that they are considering fecal transplant, they're probably ready. This also gives the biome a chance to adapt to anything particular about the individual, if possible (certa…

Many GI diseases correlate with loss of microbial diversity. That diversity can’t be recovered with diet alone - lost strains are lost. Even most probiotics are rather short lived in the GI tract.

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#23

Post by massaman_yams »

lizardactivist wrote: post #14

If we set aside problems with storage and shelf-life, would it not be possible to cultivate these bacteria and offer the treatment in the form of capsule which would be swallowed and dissolved in the intestines?

It's not quite clear if this is cultivated or not but I know this MD was working on cultivation at one point. "SER-109 is composed of approximately 50 species of Firmicutes spores derived from stool specimens from healthy donors."

https://academic.oup.com/jid/article/214/2/173/2572105

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#24

Post by throwaway920102 »

dirtyid wrote: post #20

I can't wait for celebrities to start selling their poop. On serious note, mostly have followed this over years from weight loss literature, wonder if it will be applied in reverse, find the most efficient gut flora and get transplantees to hold on to calorise more efficiently.

I bring this up to friends like once a year. It's only a matter of time until there is the stool-transplant equivalent to a sperm bank.

I often feel very fortunate to have had no mental health problems or struggles in my life, especially as I see depression and anxiety take hold in more and more of my friends in my 20s and 30s and for those who've tried literally everything else to no success I wonder what it would be like if I could be a gut microbiome donor to them. There have been studies showing reversal of mental health disorders after stool transplants. Feels like if your mental health is absolute garbage and you struggle with suicidality that rolling the dice on this couldn't get worse only better or do nothing.

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#25

Post by bombcar »

jjcon wrote: post #16
jeffrallen wrote: post #7

I just saw a documentary on this the other night on Swiss television saying that CHUV in Lausanne is doing this. So maybe "first in the English speaking world that lazy journalists have access to" would be more appropriate.

The regulatory approval is a world first - they are happening all over the world already though

I could have sworn I hear about this every 2-5 years it seems.

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#26

Post by GutThing »

I have a gut problem. I don't really know what it is. It's been like 4 or 5 years since it started.

Doctors don't seem to know what's going on but basically my stomach acid destroys my throat and I can even feel the acidity in my mouth but I don't have heartburn or any other common symptoms. I've been on omeprazole and other PPI and several more drugs without any improvement.

In all these years it stopped for around 3 weeks when the doctor prescribed me 2 antibiotics and domperidone. Then it went back to "normal". They won't prescribe me antibiotics again because after being tested everything came as negative. Now they basically tell me to take more omeprazole, which doesn't change anything.

All this made me realize that it could be a gut bacteria problem. Maybe the antibiotics killed it which made me improve and then it came back again. Maybe it was due a diet change. My only hope is that more research like this is done in the field and maybe one day I'll feel like a normal person again.

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#28

Post by sanjayio »

GutThing wrote: post #26

I have a gut problem. I don't really know what it is. It's been like 4 or 5 years since it started. Doctors don't seem to know what's going on but basically my stomach acid destroys my throat and I can even feel the acidity in my mouth but I don't have heartburn or any other common symptoms. I've been on omeprazole and other PPI and several more drugs without any improvement. In all these years it stopped for around…

Hoping you get well soon and figure this out. Have you heard of the inter abdominal pressure theory for acid reflux, which you’re describing or a theory like Chris Kresser’s?

https://chriskresser.com/how-to-cure-gerd-without-medication...

It’s a fantastic write up, that I read through when going through something similar. For me, ultimately it was controlling my weight (I’m at 12% body fat now) and tons of fiber. I feel like my case was mild though.

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#29

Post by massaman_yams »

LinuxBender wrote: post #6
polskibus wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probiotics mix would be orders of magnitude less diverse.

I am also curious about that as well. How many strains of beneficial bacteria are in feces? The probiotics I use have 20 beneficial strains but the company won't send me a non-capsule pack of the powder. They also have one with 36 strains, 120 billion CFU so it takes a lot of capsules to get a meaningful amount and takes a long time to open all the capsules. Based on my limited research it appears stool has about 100…

Table S3 here[1] starting on page 9 appears to show nearly 80 different genuses within stool samples after filtering out "vegetative (non–spore form) bacteria, fungi, parasites, and viruses" [2]. No word on how many strains per genus, but reasonable to assume multiple, if not hundreds in some cases.

[1] https://www.nejm.org/doi/suppl/10.1056/NEJMoa2106516/suppl_f... [2] https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2106516

Re: Australia gives world-first approval for fecal transplants to restore gut health

#30

Post by emmelaich »

lizardactivist wrote: post #14

If we set aside problems with storage and shelf-life, would it not be possible to cultivate these bacteria and offer the treatment in the form of capsule which would be swallowed and dissolved in the intestines?

That is mentioned in the article!

> oral delivery is expected to be available before too long.

At last you'll be able to eat shit for breakfast!

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