Gut microbiome testing and probiotics
Since gut health and the composition of the microbiome also affect general inflammation in the body, would you have recommendations for pre-biotics and probiotics that might help create a better balance between bad bacteria and good bacteria? Are tests of the microbiome composition useful?
It is being increasingly understood that gut bacteria have a significant role to play in multiple diseases. However, the problem has been that the POTENTIAL benefits and DETAILS around it are only currently being worked on and not available yet for general public use in a safe and effective manner. Several complementary health providers are doing these tests and making numerous recommendations around the results, that are not fully based on rigorously tested scientifically data. Three of the most reputed health centers in the country continue to NOT recommend such testing for routing use. Summary below: HOPKINS: Johns Hopkins researchers have NOT endorsed specific direct-to-consumer (DTC) gut microbiome tests and instead have called for greater regulation of the industry due to significant concerns about validity, reliability, and misleading claims CLEVELAND CLINIC: Cleveland Clinic does NOT currently recommend or use consumer gut microbiome tests for routine health maintenance, citing a lack of evidence for their utility due to the absence of a benchmark for a "normal" gut microbiome. MAYO CLINIC: primary applications are in research to understand the microbiome's role in disease and treatment response, NOT yet as a routine clinical diagnostic tool for everyone My own take: The path of gut microbiome testing and related recommendations is currently being defined, and is not recommended for regular use. If you do decide to pursue, it can be EXPENSIVE and result in multiple recommendations on supplementation, not backed by high quality scientific evidence Likely to change as more data evolves! Stay tuned!!! Exciting area