Scientists find a new way to treat common bowel diseases

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In a new study, researchers found a new way (a bacteria consortia) to complement missing or underrepresented functions in the imbalanced microbiome of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) patients.

It could help prevent and treat chronic immune-mediated colitis. The results are encouraging for future use in treating Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis patients.

The researchers say that this treatment can restore the normal function of the protective bacteria in the gut, targeting the source of IBD, instead of treating its symptoms with traditional methods that can cause side effects like infections or tumors.

The live bacteria consortia, called GUT-103 and GUT-108, were developed by biotech firm Gusto Global. GUT-103 is comprised of 17 strains of bacteria that work together to protect and feed each other. GUT-108 is a refined version of GUT-103.

These combinations permit the bacteria to stay in the colon for an extended amount of time, as opposed to other probiotics that are not capable of living in the gut and pass through the system quickly.

In the study, GUT-103 and GUT-108 were given orally three times a week to “germ-free” mice (no bacteria present) that had been specially developed and treated with specific human bacteria.

The therapeutic bacteria consortia worked by addressing upstream targets, rather than targeting a single cytokine to block downstream inflammation responses, and reversed established inflammation.

It also decreased bacteria that can cause harm while expanding resident protective bacteria and improved metabolic functions.

Simply put—the treatment increased the good guys and decreased the bad guys.

Because of the robust results seen in this study, and the need for more alternative therapies for Crohn’s disease, the team will conduct clinical studies about GUT-103 and GUT-108 in the future.

If you care about gut health, please read studies about this diet may strongly boost your gut health and findings of gut health strongly linked to Parkinson’s disease.

For more information about gut diseases, please see recent studies about vitamin D level in the body may influence your gut health and results showing that this common gut disease linked to early death risk.

The study is published in Nature Communications. One author of the study is Balfour Sartor, MD.

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