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Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

bbc.com

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Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#132
post #7

In the last three years, something related to my gut-brain connection got fucked. I'm not sure if it was some kind of post-viral inflammation causing stress, or stress of isolation causing inflammation. But it's definitely a two way street and mine got completely stuck in a feedback loop. The mainstream medical system failed to help me. Eventually some functional medicine doctors managed to help me improve via diet,…

Just a comment, using the term "mainstream medical system" is a "code smell" for me when discussing medical science. Have you had your gut biota analyzed to see whether there is a basis for your inflammation issues?

Yes, "big pharma" has a lot of control, but medical research is not entirely driven by them, particularly outside of the US.

It sounds like you remade your gut biota via various paths. "Traditional" medicines are "medicines" when they get through a set of actual medical clinical trials, after which they are called "medicine".

The fact that you have given yourself some form of gluten intolerance/allergy does not exactly imply "success" in what you've done so far.

Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got the opposite experience. I have IBD and recently started on some potent probiotics. Suddenly my energy and focus went up 1000%. So this is how regular people healthy live wow. I used to be lethargic all the time for 30+ years.

Putting this out there in case it may help others: My mother suffered from GERD for years and years and about two years ago, her condition seemed to have taken a turn for the worse. We’re talking waking up in the middle of the night projectile vomiting. Constant heartburn, burping and indigestion after meals and daily constipation. The doctors were completely unable to help except to recommend antacids and possibly P…

It would be interesting to know what her diet was like before you radically changed it.

In other words, changing to what appears to be a more healthy diet (fermented food, high fibre and high nutrient vegetables etc) might have worked with or without the probiotic side of things.

I definitely agree that the connection between our gut and our health/behavior is going to be a very fruitful area of reasearch over the next 5-10 years.

Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#134
post #132
post #7

In the last three years, something related to my gut-brain connection got fucked. I'm not sure if it was some kind of post-viral inflammation causing stress, or stress of isolation causing inflammation. But it's definitely a two way street and mine got completely stuck in a feedback loop. The mainstream medical system failed to help me. Eventually some functional medicine doctors managed to help me improve via diet,…

Just a comment, using the term "mainstream medical system" is a "code smell" for me when discussing medical science. Have you had your gut biota analyzed to see whether there is a basis for your inflammation issues? Yes, "big pharma" has a lot of control, but medical research is not entirely driven by them, particularly outside of the US. It sounds like you remade your gut biota via various paths. "Traditional" medic…

>"Traditional" medicines are "medicines" when they get through a set of actual medical clinical trials, after which they are called "medicine".

To be fair, Tylenol almost certainly wouldn't pass clinical trials today. Selling a drug OTC that so easily causes organ(liver) damage? Ridiculous. So would most NSAIDS-- as those cause stomach bleeding even in regular clinical doses. That also would imply that companies had an interest in testing natural treatments that may not sell well

Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#135
There is an interesting book on the related topic - "This Is Your Brain on Food"[0]. If you like to try changes in the diet then there are a lot of suggestions in the book. But you might find the book to be quite verbose and repetitive.

[0] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/49088685-this-is-your-br...

Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#136
post #134
post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just a comment, using the term "mainstream medical system" is a "code smell" for me when discussing medical science. Have you had your gut biota analyzed to see whether there is a basis for your inflammation issues? Yes, "big pharma" has a lot of control, but medical research is not entirely driven by them, particularly outside of the US. It sounds like you remade your gut biota via various paths. "Traditional" medic…

>"Traditional" medicines are "medicines" when they get through a set of actual medical clinical trials, after which they are called "medicine". To be fair, Tylenol almost certainly wouldn't pass clinical trials today. Selling a drug OTC that so easily causes organ(liver) damage? Ridiculous. So would most NSAIDS-- as those cause stomach bleeding even in regular clinical doses. That also would imply that companies had…

In addition most traditional medicine is centered around use of whole herbs. Lots of times there's complex processing that goes into it, but it's still something you can often just... grow. Clinical trials are extremely expensive and with the incentive system we have right now it'd make 0 sense for a company to invest in proving that something you can grow in your backyard can help treat something

The WHO on the other hand has been investing heavily in traditional and complementary medicine (T&CM) in developing countries as they offer "care that is close to homes, accessible and affordable. It is also culturally acceptable and trusted by large numbers of people". Interestingly, the use and research into traditional medicine is actually increasing worldwide. The US seems to be pretty unique, even compared to developed nations, in how little it values TM. The WHO report linked below points out that 100 million Europeans, 76% of Singapore, and 86% of South Koreans commonly use TM. It also points out interesting research like:

> Another recent study indicates that patients whose general practitioner has additional complementary and alternative medicine training have lower health care costs and mortality rates than those who do not. Reduced costs were the outcome of fewer hospital stays and fewer prescription drugs (31)

Interestingly, they differentiate TM from CM. TM being a country's actual traditional medicine system and the knowledge passed down across many generations (e.g. Unani, Ayurveda, TCM, etc) and CM being more like "alternative medicine" that is not part of a country's traditional system (anthroposophic medicine, chiropractic, homeopathy, naturopathy, osteopathy, etc; think your aunt trying to sell you essential oils)

https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789241506096

Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#137
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Edit: Do you take the one I linked, or this prescription grade extra strength? https://www.visbiome.com/collections/all/products/visbiome-e... ($6.2/day without insurance coverage) ----- Thanks! For anyone in Canada or USA wondering, I just searched and apparently you can buy it online now. About $2 a day: https://www.visbiome.com/collections/all/products/visbiome-c... I had looked years ago and found it hard to get.…

I'm sorry, but a probiotic that only lists the ingredients as "lactic acid bacteria"? For all you know this could be the equivalent of buying some Danone Activia. It also has "lactic acid bacteria". I want at least the name of each of the bacteria. Even better would be exact substrains. But if it doesn't tell me whether the main ingredient is a strain that produces histamine (bad for me personally - lots of headaches…

I don’t know if this answers what you were trying to find, but the probiotic in question is pretty heavily studied….there are even many papers discussing histamine levels

I haven’t had it and can’t vouch for it but it’s not exactly some random probiotic.

https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=vsl+...

Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got the opposite experience. I have IBD and recently started on some potent probiotics. Suddenly my energy and focus went up 1000%. So this is how regular people healthy live wow. I used to be lethargic all the time for 30+ years.

Putting this out there in case it may help others: My mother suffered from GERD for years and years and about two years ago, her condition seemed to have taken a turn for the worse. We’re talking waking up in the middle of the night projectile vomiting. Constant heartburn, burping and indigestion after meals and daily constipation. The doctors were completely unable to help except to recommend antacids and possibly P…

you might want to supplement with gelatine to help rebuild anything that was damaged by the acid.

I was suffering from reflux, switched to mostly carnivore diet and only get heartburn now when I eat or drink the wrong things. Tea does that to me, or the occasional piece of bread.

Also Depression went away, haven't done any gut micro biota testing, because it's expensive and I'm not rich.

Re: Some gut bacteria appear to communicate with the brain

#140
post #7

In the last three years, something related to my gut-brain connection got fucked. I'm not sure if it was some kind of post-viral inflammation causing stress, or stress of isolation causing inflammation. But it's definitely a two way street and mine got completely stuck in a feedback loop. The mainstream medical system failed to help me. Eventually some functional medicine doctors managed to help me improve via diet,…

I got the opposite experience. I have IBD and recently started on some potent probiotics. Suddenly my energy and focus went up 1000%. So this is how regular people healthy live wow. I used to be lethargic all the time for 30+ years.

What was the probiotic you used?
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