Probiotics and CD discussed at recent Kaiser patient group meeting

[Guest guest]

At the recent celiac meeting at Kaiser Santa Clara, Dr. Wong, a pediatric gastroenterologist at the clinic there discussed probiotics and CD. He said that a number of rigorous scientific studies are mostly in vitro rather than in vivo but that their results generally show that probiotics can inhibit or, even, stop gliadin-caused damage. (I gave him a couple of recent abstracts of such that he hadn't seen that also argue well for probiotics likely value in humans.*) He also noted that the anecdotal evidence is pretty good. Consequently, he does recommend to a number of his patients that they take probiotic complexes that contain a greater variety and tens of billions of bacteria as a dietary supplement. He gave a couple of examples, including VSL#3.Those who already

use such products as VSL#3, Ultimate Flora, Flora Q, and Florastor know that they are relatively expensive and non-prescription (I checked with our Kaiser pharmacy). I have also not researched yet whether it is a good idea to go from no added bacteria beyond that in yogurt to something like VSL#3, which claims 450 billion total of eight different bacteria). Trader Joe's does offer a starting point in its Trader Darwin's Acidophilus & Probiotic Complex, which contains "4 billion organisms (at time of manufacture)" consisting of Lactobacillus acidophilus, Lactobacillus helveticus, Bifidobacterium bifidum and Streptococcus thermophilus. It is $5.99 for 50 tablets taken two at a time. HogleFreelance academic librarianInstructor, online researchEmail: jjhogle@...Web: www.blueroom.comReality ain't what you think it isArt Graphics & Photographs[http://www.blueroom.com/realityaint.htm]* The following is the Title and Abstract of a study just out in the June 2008 Clinical and Experimental Immunology (pp 552-8):Live

probiotic Bifidobacterium lactis bacteria inhibit the toxic effects induced by

wheat gliadin in epithelial cell culture.Wheat gliadin induces severe intestinal symptoms

and small-bowel mucosal damage in coeliac disease patients. At present, the

only effective treatment for the disease is a strict life-long gluten-free

diet. In this study we investigated whether probiotics Lactobacillus fermentum

or Bifidobacterium lactis can

inhibit the toxic effects of gliadin in intestinal cell culture conditions. The

ability of live probiotics to inhibit peptic-tryptic digested gliadin-induced

damage to human colon cells Caco-2 was evaluated by measuring epithelial

permeability by transepithelial resistance, actin cytoskeleton arrangements by

the extent of membrane ruffling and expression of tight junctional protein

ZO-1. B. lactis inhibited the gliadin-induced increase dose-dependently in

epithelial permeability, higher concentrations completely abolishing the

gliadin-induced decrease in transepithelial resistance. The same bacterial

strain also inhibited the formation of membrane ruffles in Caco-2 cells induced

by gliadin administration. Furthermore, it also protected the tight junctions

of Caco-2 cells against the effects of gliadin, as evinced by the pattern of

ZO-1 expression. We conclude thus that

live B. lactis bacteria can counteract directly the harmful effects exerted by

coeliac-toxic gliadin and would clearly warrant further studies of its

potential as a novel dietary supplement in the treatment of coeliac disease.