The answer to treating the nearly 500,000 patients who suffer from Clostridium difficile infections every year in U.S. hospitals may reside in the human gut, according to Brookings-based South Dakota State University researchers who are turning to gut bacteria for new ways to fight infection.
If headlines are to be believed, the research community seems to be poised on the edge of a huge cache of useful innovations and discoveries stemming from gut microbe investigation, including findings that tie the microscopic critters to weight regulation, cognition and overall health. And hospital-acquired infection treatments are no different — researchers have found more than nearly 100 percent of patients experience relief from C. diff infections when undergoing fecal transplants with the stool of a donor who has a healthy balance of gut bacteria. This type of procedure restores order to an imbalance in the microbiome community that contributes to an environment where pathogens can thrive.
"Condition-specific probiotics are the future of industry," Joy Scaria, PhD, a researcher from South Dakota State University's Animal Disease Research and Diagnostic laboratory, said in a statement.
But there are near-countless strains in the human gut, and narrowing down which "good" bacteria will produce effective probiotic mixes is no easy task. The SDSU team has producing promising preliminary data for several strains, though, and are using mini-bioreactors to mimic the conditions of the human stomach for testing as many as five bacterial strains at once, in hopes of engineering a fruitful combination. Formulas found to be effective will then be tested in germ-free pigs to determine their efficacy.
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