VSL#3 instead of SCD yogurt?

[copeland]

Hi,

I've been thinking about trying to make a huge change and going on the SCD. I was wondering if anyone had experience using VSL3 to repopulate the gut with good bacteria instead of yogurt.

I know a lot of people have had good luck with SCD, and I don't have anything to lose by trying it (other than the joy of carbs), but I doubt I'm organized enough to make my own yogurt and keep track of it. I happen to have some VSL3 packets that are still good, and wanted to try those instead, maybe.

Thanks,

-Dan

 

[hugh]

Generally probiotic pills will not repopulate your gut,
The pill may contain 6 to 14 different vatities of bacteria that are able to be grown in a lab, they represent a tiny percentage of the bacteria in a healthy gut and have usually lost their 'adherant' qualities, that is they don't stick around.
They have a very limited range of bacteria and are usually transient in nature. This means that they help as they pass through but do not repopulate your intestine[1].
Kifir is easier than yougurt (done at room temperature) and has a wider range of bacteria and a greater number [1].
I found this a good article on beneficial bacteria......(article 4 of 4)
Bowel Disease, Part IV: Restoring Healthful Gut Flora
http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2010/07/bowel-disease-part-iv-restoring-healthful-gut-flora/

[1] https://chriskresser.com/kefir-the-not-quite-paleo-superfood

 

[copeland]

Are you sure that your information applies to VSL3?

It has a lot of species, and pretty large numbers of bacteria, and is supposed to be specifically made for IBD.

 

[hugh]

No, i'm not positive about this particular brand, but I have seen no reason to believe that these probiotics have an adhesiveness that others have not.
It may be so.
Until you try VSL#3 you won't know, it may help you alot.
(If you are not used to probiotics start with a small dose and build up, they can have extreme effects when you begin)

I have to say at this point that I did not do well on yougurt, and improved on SCD more without it. Some make their yougurt with sheep or goat milk and find this is tolerated better.
Kefir is much easier than yougurt as it is done at room temperature, and it has a greater number of a wider variety of bacteria than a probiotic capsule.

One way that they help is to suppress the harmful bacteria allowing the remnants of beneficial bacteria still present to repopulate, but if species are extinct or below a viable threshold this won't help.
(an analogy -if you wanted to populate a zoo it doesn't matter how many penguins you put in there, you will never get a gibbon appearing until you put a gibbon in)

VSL#3 only contains 8 strains of bacteria (from an estimated 1500 different strains found in our gut), so even if these species did repopulate it would still do nothing for the other 1492 (approx) species that are out of whack.

The bacteria in VSL#3:
-Bifidobacterium breve
-Bifidobacterium longum
-Bifidobacterium infantis
-Lactobacillus acidophilus
-Lactobacillus plantarum
-Lactobacillus paracasei
-Lactobacillus bulgaricus
-Streptococcus thermophilus

Probiotic Supplements Are Inadequate
"Most supermarket probiotics contain Lactobacillus or Bifidobacterium species. These species are specialized for digesting milk; they populate the guts of infants as they start breastfeeding, and are used by the dairy industry to ferment cheeses and yogurt.

These supplements are very effective at fighting acute diarrhea from most food-borne infections. A fistful of probiotic capsules taken every hour will usually quickly supplant the pathogens and end diarrhea.

However, against more severe bowel diseases caused by chronic infections and featuring damaged intestinal mucosa, these species are usually not helpful. One issue is that they provide only a tiny part of a healthful adult microbiome. A recent study surveyed the bacterial species in the human gut, and found these species to be most abundant :
Figure: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3779803/figure/F3/
As this figure shows, Bacteroides spp. are the most common commensal bacteria, with Bacteroides uniformis alone providing almost 10% of all bacterial genes in the gut. Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium do not appear among the 57 most abundant species.

This study showed, by the way, that patients with irritable bowel syndrome have 25% fewer types of bacterial gene in their gut than healthy people, and that the composition of bacterial genes in feces clearly distinguishes ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease, and healthy patients. In other words, in the bowel diseases a few pathogen species have colonized the gut and entirely denuded it of about 25% of the commensal species that normally populate the gut. This finding supports the idea that restoring those missing species might be therapeutic for IBS."
http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2010/07/bowel-disease-part-iv-restoring-healthful-gut-flora/

 

[lbligh]

SCD isn't supposed to have any Bifidus, right?

 

[hugh]

I'm a bit rusty there,
I think that's right.........
and a google confirms-
This one had a reference specifically to VSL#3
Sheila's Comments Regarding Bifidus and VSL#3
"The VSL#3 is illegal and I certainly don't recommend it.
I've consulted with a few people who have gone into massive flares after trying the VSL#3. Also I know lots who have had major problems with bifidum bacteria (especially when on SCD).
Perhaps it is because the SCD clears out the harmful microbes and bifidum takes over, overgrowing into huge numbers. The by-products of bifidum bacteria could be what sends people into flares - especially those who have sensitive guts or those at the beginning of the diet, these people unfortunately have "fertile ground" for bifidum bacteria to overgrow."
http://www.pecanbread.com/p/probiotics1.html
Scientific Proof for the Risks Associated with Bifidus
http://gapsfacts.com/bifidus57.html
"The strain we must avoid in our SCD™ yoghurt is Bifidus as it has been found to cause bacterial overgrowth in the gut."
http://www.breakingtheviciouscycle..../yoghurt-what-kind-of-yoghurt-starter-to-use/
http://www.breakingtheviciouscycle.info/knowledge_base/detail/bifidus/

Before we get into the good stuff we have to touch on Bifidobacteria. It’s a hot topic in the SCD community for the reason that it can “take over” and cause health problems in some cases.
It is a beneficial bacteria, but the problem is, it’s just not a good neighbor at times. So sometimes it can overgrow in and of itself.
So just to be on the safe side we usually recommend avoiding it in the beginning of the healing journey, but later on it can really help…
http://scdlifestyle.com/2011/08/scd-probiotics-what-you-really-need-to-know/

 

[bert]

I have used vsl#3 many times and find that it can be quite helpfull in the short term but the effect doesn't seem to build up when I take it daily.

I have found, in the past, that when my symptoms are bad taking a sachet of vsl can bring an improvement overnight but if I keep taking it every day it doesn't stop the symptoms from returning.

 

[copeland]

Thanks a lot for the information! You must be better at googling than me, I didn't turn anything up.

Another question then -

From what I've read, kefir has somewhere between 12 and 60 strains of bacteria (the organic Lifeway stuff says 12 on the bottle, people who make it themselves have said 60 for homemade stuff).

How is that much better, when compared to the 1500 number you quoted?

Thanks,

-Dan Hall

 

[hugh]

Good question,
first, i've seen experts claiming any thing from 200 to 2000 species, and no-one has all of them, so 1500 may be a guess at the number of species that may be found in an average intestine or it may be a guess at the whole range across the world of which we only have a few hundred depending on location, diet and exposure.

firstly - 60 is 7 times more than 8 so i get your point, it's still only a few more, but my point is it's more.
secondly - there is a much higher number- each cup of kefir is equivalent (depending on your kefir and your source of statistics) to a bottle of probiotics
thirdly- the cost is a fraction of the cost of probiotic pills
fourthly (that's not a word, is it?) - there are bacteria and yeasts in kefir that cannot be bred in labs

I don't recommend just kefir, the wider variety of fermented foods you can get the better.
Kefir is just one but the topic of the thread was about yougurt so i thought it was worth a mention.

Whatever you do, don't forget to start slow as i know of almost as many people who claim bad reactions to probiotics as i do with good reactions.

The next step after probiotics is to look at fecal transplants.
Personally i think you are probably wasting your time if you haven't cut out gluten and toxic foods, but that's a whole 'nuther topic.....

 

[copeland]

Thanks hugh. I'm new to the SCD/Paleo/GAPS idea, so it helps to have someone more experienced sort some of this out. There's a lot of contradictory info out there from sources with widely varying levels of authority.

I don't entirely understand why wheat, legumes, fructose, and fiber are described as toxic in the site you linked; toxic (to me) means poisonous, and there are billions of people eating those foods without any difficulties. Is it fair to call that toxic?

Fecal transplants are definitely also on my radar; they seem very promising (from the small and mostly anecdotal amount I've read).

 

[hugh]

There's a lot of contradictory info out there from sources with widely varying levels of authority.

There sure are, and i get stuff wrong alot too, so never be afraid to check with people/books etc.
There are so many good sites but "pecan bread", "the paleo mom","perfect health diet" and "SCD lifestyle" stand out as a good start.

I don't entirely understand why wheat, legumes, fructose, and fiber are described as toxic in the site you linked; toxic (to me) means poisonous, and there are billions of people eating those foods without any difficulties. Is it fair to call that toxic?

The article i linked to was the third in a series of 4, the second[1] was about toxicity, and is well referenced.
I don't want to get into that debate here (i've got into it hundreds of times, and it comes down to who you want to believe)
The thing about diets to treat IBD (or almost anything) is that they change lots of factors, get a good result and then say that it was because of A,B or C when nobody knows what it was for sure.
I like this[2] article's take on that belief system and food connection. It also lays out quite well how much our diets have changed recently as well as since the paleolithic.

They all work on theories that haven't been disproved, but that's not the same as being proved. (don't hold your breath, gravity and evolution are still just theories)
I have no problem with the theory that some foods are 'toxic' because i'm at the stage where i can eat them and get sick
If you give up gluten and feel better then you don't need proof from someone else.
There are billions eating these new[3] foods and there has been an explosion of disease since then. This is not proof but it is a theory that you might want to take seriously

Fecal transplants are definitely also on my radar; they seem very promising (from the small and mostly anecdotal amount I've read).

Like i said, look at them once you are on a healing (diet) path - that's only my opinion

[1] Bowel Disease, Part II: Healing the Gut By Eliminating Food Toxins
http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2010/0...i-healing-the-gut-by-eliminating-food-toxins/

[2] Raw Vegan, Blood Type O and the Paleo Diet – what do they have in common?
http://paleozonenutrition.com/2012/...d-the-paleo-diet-what-do-they-have-in-common/

[3] I call them new because they are not like they were not so long ago.
For example - synthetic chemicals, flavours, antioxidants, sweeteners, colours, preservatives
But you can do your own research and come to your own conclusions

 

[hugh]

@ copeland-
having thought about it, and although i think kefir is a good probiotic, you should probably go with SCD yogurt otherwise you will not know is SCD works for you.
Maybe move to kefir later?

 

[copeland]

Thanks so much hugh.

Looks like I still have a lot of research to do. Thanks for the resources!