Scientists at the Public Health England's laboratory at Heartlands Hospital in Birmingham, U.K., are claiming a 90 percent success rate for C. diff patients treated with fecal transplants after conventional antibiotics failed to rid them of the infection.
About a third of patients who fail to respond to conventional C. diff treatment can die, Peter Hawkey, MD, professor at the Birmingham University's School of Immunity and Infection in the U.K., told BBC News.
After being screened for disease, volunteer donors provide stool samples to the laboratory. These are analyzed and filtered with a sterile solution, resulting in a liquid that is delivered to the patient's stomach via a tube through the nose.
So far more than 20 people have been treated for C. diff using this method.