I Was Wrong About Probiotics.

In this video, I explain
1. The truth about the microbiome, probiotics and prebiotics
2. Why probiotic supplements may actually do you more harm than good
3. Who should take probiotics and when, and
4. Practical tips for improving the health of your microbiome without spending money on probiotic supplements

Chapters:

00:56 – What is the gut microbiome
01:36 – What is a probiotic
02:03 – What is a prebiotic
03:23– Why probiotics could be harmful
08:05 – Benefits of probiotics
11:15 – Where can you get probiotics?

References:

[Darius-ujgv]

I work for FDA. 99.99% of "dietary supplements" are absolutely unnecessary. Just eat a balanced diet, don't smoke, avoid alcohol. Drink water.

[insederec]

Really is too bad that the cheapest foods are low in fiber and absent of fermented ingredients in the US. It feels very expensive to be healthy

[TheCaznut]

It all boils down to:

- be skeptical of what you put in your body
- a good diet will be better for you than almost any other intervention

[MNNski]

I've struggled with poor digestive health since I was a kid and had appendicitis. At the time they gave me antibiotics which messed up my gut microbiome. About a year ago I started making smoothies with fruits, berries, juice, and yogurt with active cultures. I've been far healthier and able to eat food I've not been able to eat for decades. It's completely changed my life.

[KxNOxUTA]

Petition to re-frame "bacteria that don't do anything" to "We do not yet know what they do" cause the error of labelling stuff "useless" in medicine to be later mistaken is repeated in history. So not again! X'D

[hughbryant]

That Yakult thumbnail will for sure draw a lot of east & southeast asians down here. :)

[MissingRaptor]

So much respect to you for posting this video where you are saying that you've learned something new and are changing your mind in accordance with the new information. Far too many people tend to double down and it's frustrating.
Thanks for being like this

[JohnnStr]

We need more people like this telling us truth! Just finished reading The 23 Former Doctor Truths by Lauren Clark. Its fascinating what they hide from society.

[matthewdee]

A (paraphrased) quote I came across a few years back was "trying to replace your gut biome with a probiotic yogurt drink is like cutting down the amazon and replacing it with row after row of corn."

[adotinthecosmos]

I suffered from bad breath from a young age. I brushed my teeth 10x a day, chronically chewed gum, even carried a tube of toothpaste around with me all day. One day my pediatrician recommended acidophilus. I have been taking it since and my bad breath hasn't been a problem.

[dreamannemusic]

I love how even though this video is 15 minutes long, it keeps your interest the entire time!

[DoodlesPrince]

I have a balanced diet and i have been told i have a good gut biome. I love yogurt and kimchi too. The only thing I probably lack is consuming the recommended amount of water daily. Anyways, I do occasionally drink Yakult, and personally havent experienced anything negative from consuming that probiotic and have been consuming it since I was really young.

But, my partner, who has an extremely bad diet, and isnt the healthiest, just started drinking yakult with me, and like those 50% of unhealthy people mentioned in the video, that saw an increase in health, my partner is similar. They do seem to be benefitting drinking it, much more than me.

Really goes to show everyone gut biomes react very differently.

[ChrissyCat]

As someone who was born in the late 80's and had chronic ear/nose/throat infections, so was on antibiotics a lot. I think the antibiotics are to blame for my IBS and in general GI issues. Weirdly though, all my issues started just after I got my first period.
Anyway, after starting following you on instagram earlier this year, your knowledge has helped me get my doctor to take my stomach issues seriously. Can't thank you enough for that!
So many doctors have just told me "It's just IBS, you just have to live with it." etc. But my life quality is awful, and my stomach issues got worse in winter 2023, then in april this year it got even worse. Finally going to the hospital for thourough testing etc. in October.

[victoriar]

The fact that nobody talks about censored book called The 23 Former Doctor Truths by Lauren Clark really gets to me. Always loved people like Rachel, it opens our eyes

[aternias]

Probiotics pretty much cured my IBS i had for years. I take it every day, and I never have had any IBS symptoms since.

[char]

Considering how expensive they can be it's actually kind of a relief they're not what they're hyped up to be lol

[babykata-dtys]

I love yogurt. Put some chocolate granola on it and you can basically have dessert for breakfast without people judging you.

[Wyrdwad]

All I know is, I've been a sufferer of regular IBS flareups for around 15 years now, and it's impacted my quality of life quite significantly -- and thus far, nothing any doctor has ever prescribed has ever helped curb it. Drinking one Yakult per day, however, has -- and quite noticeably, at that. And as I presently live in Tokyo -- just down the road from one of the main Yakult production facilities, as it happens -- I'm able to get Yakult readily and cheaply, and I've been able to lead a relatively IBS flareup-free life for almost the entire 5 years I've been living here thanks to it.

Whatever studies may say, it's hard to argue with results, so I shall continue to drink my daily Yakult!

[umufzqc]

Before I begin watching and purely for my own enjoyment (yes, very weird, I know):
- Microbiome theory to me, was a literal temper on the idea of germ theory. Suddenly, so many things made sense (in the 90s).
- After travelling overseas to poorer nations as a young teen, I was shocked by how people lived... and were OK. Mum married a an Indian Doctor in Malaysia, the skin conditions were the most memorable as a child.
- After living in China and seeing people eat food that I couldn't without getting ill, I started questioning the obsession with sterility (which I now know is never actually sterile anyway) my grandmother taught me (she was an old nurse).
- After eating the food for a few years and not getting ill, I learned about adhesion of enterococci to the intestinal wall and the production of molecules that stop this adhesion. Not really microbiome, but it definitely got me thinking.
- Started taking Yakult in China and it DID seem to help quite a lot, though not significantly more than a placebo would have.
- Learned about fiber... fiber fiber fiber. Learned about how we evolved with hundreds of times more fiber in out diet and basically bred fiber out of modern crops. Fiber is king. Fiber food for the organisms that ARE you that outnumber YOUR (genetically) cells. We are each a complex ecosystem and fiber is the key.

So my guesses are:
- we still need more studies to have real clarity.
- We don't have a complete picture of a healthy vs unhealthy microbiome.
- Supplement industry is the wild west.
- These are probably beneficial bacteria and may help those depleted, but probably don't help healthy people much.
- Fiber is better.
- Fresh fruit and veg is better (and we still don't really know why. It could be partially hormetic, it could be to do with microbiota, it could be as-yet unknown functions of phenolic and other phytocompounds in plants. Likely it's a mix of all the above.

Let's see how totally wrong I was.

[jassewalton]

This is an interesting and helpful video dear Dr Karan. You are one of the few doctors who acknowledge the importance of gut health and how to address it. I went through surgery for bowel cancer, and NO-ONE on the hospital team mentioned gut health. Likewise another surgery for tumour secondaries, where they had to remove my (healthy) gallbladder as it was sitting contiguous to a small secondary... no mention of diet post-gallbladder. Plus, a lot of the hospital food I wouldnt feed to my dog. Im lucky that the cancer (Adenosarcoma) was only second stage, and so far I'm doing ok. Plus I've long been a supporter of the 'You are what you eat' notion.