Community Forum

 Reply posted for mseefeldt.

My son also takes VsL#3 for his crohns He takes 2 capsules in am and 2 in the pm. and  I believe it has helped him.I have noticed since taking this his Vitamin b level has been very elevated  In the 1500 range. I have read that elevated b levels can be due to SIBO. Any thoughts on this and could the levels be up because of the probiotic? 

 Reply posted for mseefeldt.

I have a huge respect for Lutz and Allen. My uc was well controlled on minimal medication for 5 years and diet didn't seem to have much effect. I too ate quite well with little processed  food. whole milk, cream and meat with plenty fat but I did use sunflower oil regularly.

Then everything went wrong and I started using scd diet, more out of desperation than hope. It resolved many minor problems very fast and has kept uc under control without steroids for over 5 years. On many occasions I found that unexpected changes were described in LWB usually as a very small passing observation which had not seemed important on first reading.

I do think gut bacteria are really important and that diet and probiotics can be used to modify them to help but the more I have read the more sure I am becoming that the real underlying problem is our ability to deal with these bacteria. Pufa oils are highly reactive and disrupt cell membranes. immune system, hormones and I think nerve signals all of which should protect us and help us work in symbiosis with gut flora.

A very interesting paper that I read some time ago concluded that a high proportion of uc sufferers showed signs of vagal nerve damage and I don't think it is a coincidence that an expensive aloe vera supplement which I tried in the early stages came with instructions to do regular breathing exercises as well as diet modifications. I would really like to know more about the effect of diet on the nervous system but I have a lot of science to catch up with my rusty degree in animal science.

 Reply posted for Lca.

That's funny - Allen (Life with Less Bread) was my old boss.  I generally agree with a lot of that book and the general understanding that less carbs is good.  I think they were a bit a head of their time.  

I've also seen the papers on Nissle 1917 (Mutaflor) and think that it would be good to use as well.  The good thing was that I've generally eaten well (non-processed foods/good fats/lower carb) before and after UC, so there hasn't been a big change for me.  I personally haven't noticed diet being a big factor for me - but I'm also lucky and only have had two flares in six years and don't seem to be too sensitive.  You have a lot of good advice to give - decrease of omega 6's seems to be a key trend.  If I have issues though, I'll keep an even more carb restricted diet in mind.  

Matt 

 Reply posted for Lca.

That's funny - Allen (Life with Less Bread) was my old boss.  I generally agree with a lot of that book and the general understanding that less carbs is good.  The good thing was that I've generally eaten well (non-processed foods) before and after UC, so there hasn't been a big change for me.  I personally haven't noticed diet being a big factor for me - but I'm also lucky and only have had two flares in six years and don't seem to be too sensitive.  If I have issues though, I'll keep it in mind.  

Matt 

 Reply posted for mseefeldt.

Hi Matt,

Another probiotic you might want to look at is Mutaflor. It's the only one that really seemed to make a difference to me. VSL made me very nauseous with vomiting and D. (UC 10 years and scd/high fat low carb diet 5 years).

Do investigate diet more thoroughly. The right probiotics and supplements do far more to help when the underlying diet is right. Have you read about scd or gaps diet. They can both make a big difference and when you look into the underlying science there are good reasons. Life without Bread  by Lutz and Allen is a good place to start and the blog Hyperlipid and another by Jack Kruse have some fascinating scientific theories about our diets and health.

Reducing omega 6 in the diet is probably far more effective than adding o3  use only good fats such as butter, coconut oil and animal fats and cut out refined oils. I add vitamin D3, eat liver regularly for vit A and have recently started a K2  mk4 supplement.According to Lutz uc is one of the slowest problems to respond fully to diet changes but  it really does work.

 Reply posted for mseefeldt.

so in short - it really made a big difference for me and has a lot of technical merit. i would never say don't take your meds - they should always be used. but i would definately take an integrative approach and try to support the western meds with probiotics. my doctors really diminished the use of probiotics (there wern't that many papers in 2005), but the more mechanistic side suggests that there is something to it, and i really wish the docs hadn't diminished the potential effect. the lack of clinical studies is more due to the cost of such studies for non-patentable products more than anything else. lastly, it can't hurt and its worth a shot - but again don't *** around, make sure you buy probiotics that have been shown to help in the pnas paper. they all aren't the same.

hope this helps - i would be happy to talk science with those that are interested.

matt

 Reply posted for mseefeldt.

likely due to western diet, and the fact that we are too clean in the western world and don't have parasites ect (another story altogether) , its quite easy for our tregs to get downregulated in western society. consequently, i read up quite a bit on how to upregulate tregs. after numerous reviews, the things i identified are vitamin d, fish oils, probiotics, and vitamin a. the key to this is that you can't *** around - for fish oils, you need 4-5 grams/day. that's alot of pills. for probiotics, i take two satchels of vsl3/day. i'm highly confident that the run of the mill "probiotics" do not have enough kick to make a difference in your li flora as you have so much mass there to begin with (again 60% of your crap is flora). why vsl3 versus others - i haven't done a detailed study on other probiotics but vsl3 contains the bacteria that were cited in this pnas paper to eliminate uc in murine studies. (see proceeding of the national academy of sciences, kwon, 2009, pg 2160 - its freely accessed)