Article on Iron and Probiotics

NSSG,

Thanks for posting.

You'd think doctors would tell you NOT to take Iron, knowing this.

 

Hmmm, the doctor quoted is from a School of Veterinary Science, do they do studies on humans too? It sounds interesting but more information would be nice, human studies IOW.

I'm the last author on that paper, and yes I'm from a vet school. I'm a microbiologist, so I just work on bacteria, mainly human some animal. The medic is the man in the middle of the list. And yes, I do do work on humans too.

Iron is needed as a supplement in IBD, I'm not arguing with that. The problem is that it is necessary for patients to keep taking it, so how can we make probiotics work? The reason for highlighting that probiotics don't do well with iron is really to see what other medica and scientists think about it, and whether others can come up with creative answers to this problem. It's early days with this research, we have a potential probiotic that we think could be promising, and we'll be heading to human trials as soon as we can.

Yes, the press relaese and quotes are a suggestion, based on evidence of what probiotics do with iron in our tests, so part opinion and part observation and experimentation. It's a suggestion of a different approach, and I'd be very happy if it helps with developing treatments.

Oh, and some of the stories out there have played a game of chinese whispers with our original publication - see

dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0026507

for what we actually said.

Post Edited (tacogan) : 10/23/2011 11:54:57 PM (GMT-6)

Thanks for posting tacogan. Very interesting work :)

I am hopeful that we see a product that is more effective for people with IBD. I no longer take probiotics and I don't feel I have suffered any consequences since stopping. It would be nice if there were a product that I felt confident was doing something beneficial.