Researchers assessed the prevalence of inpatient probiotic use among a sample of 145 U.S. hospitals in a recent study published in the American Journal of Infection Control. The study showed probiotic use has grown considerably in recent years.
According to the authors of the study, the data on probiotic use can help inform clinical guidance, public health efforts and research directions. The authors estimated inpatient probiotic use with the MarketScan Hospital Drug Database.
All total, the researchers identified 51,723 hospitalizations in 2012 in which probiotics were used. Here are three findings form the study:
1. Patients receiving probiotics were nine times more likely to receive antimicrobials and 21 times more likely to have a Clostridium difficile infection
2. The most common probiotic formulations were:
- Saccharomyces boulardii (32 percent of patients receiving probiotics)
- Lactobacillus acidophilus and Lactobacillus bulgaricus (30 percent)
- L. acidophilus (28 percent)
- Lactobacillus rhamnosus (11 percent)
3. Probiotic use increased from 1 percent of all discharges in 2006 to 2.9 percent of all discharges in 2012