{"id":1839,"date":"2015-12-17T12:28:06","date_gmt":"2015-12-17T12:28:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/?p=1839"},"modified":"2015-12-20T12:31:48","modified_gmt":"2015-12-20T12:31:48","slug":"alert-the-worst-antibiotics-for-your-gut-health","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/alert-the-worst-antibiotics-for-your-gut-health\/","title":{"rendered":"Alert: The Worst Antibiotics for Your Gut Health"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Antibotic_Gut\"<\/h1>\n<\/div>\n

From Bottom Line Health<\/em><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

How bad are antibiotics for your digestion and gut health, really?<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the answer: Worse than you may have ever imagined<\/em>.<\/p>\n

The latest study finds that the damage from certain common kinds of antibiotics may unsettle the beneficial bacteria in your gut for months, even a year\u2014in ways that could lead to diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease<\/em>, even increase risk for\u00a0colon cancer<\/em>.<\/p>\n

But some other antibiotics disturb your gut for only a week or so. Here\u2019s information on which antibiotics are the most dangerous for your gastrointestinal health\u2014and how to protect yourself from them.<\/p>\n

HOW FOUR COMMON ANTIBIOTICS AFFECT YOUR GUT<\/h4>\n

We humans are more colonies than individuals. We rely on multitudes of beneficial bacteria in our gut and our mouths to thrive. To find out what happens to our gut microsystem during a single<\/em> course of antibiotics, Swedish and British researchers gave healthy adults either a placebo or an oral antibiotic. They collected samples of saliva and feces before and after a course of antibiotics.<\/p>\n

Four common types were studied\u2026<\/p>\n

\u2022 Amoxicillin<\/em>. Class: Penicillin-like. It\u2019s prescribed to treat bronchitis, gonorrhea and infections of the ears, nose, throat, urinary tract and skin.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Minocycline<\/em>. Class: Tetracycline. It\u2019s prescribed to treat respiratory infections, acne and other skin conditions, as well as urinary and genital infections.<\/p>\n

\u2022 Ciprofloxacin<\/em>. Class: Fluoroquinolone. It\u2019s prescribed to treat urinary tract infections, as well as anthrax. It\u2019s commonly called \u201cCipro.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2022 Clindamycin<\/em>. Class: Lincomycin. It\u2019s prescribed for infections of the lungs and skin and for vaginal infections.<\/p>\n

Not surprisingly, all of the antibiotics knocked out many of the beneficial bacteria both in the study participants\u2019 saliva and in feces. The good news is that in the mouth, the \u201cgood\u201d bugs repopulated pretty quickly after all four kinds of antibiotics.<\/p>\n

But the gut didn\u2019t do so well. For the amoxicillin, the concentration of good gut bugs was disturbed for about a week. For monocyline, it was about a month. But for the heavy hitters ciprofloxacin and clindamycin, the damage was more lasting. They wiped out<\/em> many of the beneficial bugs.<\/p>\n

In particular, they destroyed several kinds of common gut bacteria that produce a short-chain fatty acid called butyrate\u2014<\/em>which is increasingly being recognized as one key to a healthy colon. Butyrate inhibits inflammation, acts as a powerful protective antioxidant and helps stop cancer from forming. When good-for-you bugs are killed and stop producing butyrate, other studies have shown, that can contribute to digestive disorders such as inflammatory bowel disease.<\/p>\n

In this study, ciprofloxacin and clindamycin wiped out the butyrate producers for several months\u2014and in some cases, as long as a year.<\/p>\n

Does this study mean you should never accept a prescription for these antibiotics? That\u2019s going too far, since some infections that can be treated by these and other antibiotics can be life-threatening. But if you are prescribed antibiotics in the fluoroquinolone or lincomycin classes, discuss with your doctor if there are alternative classes of antibiotics that may work for your specific infection.<\/p>\n

And there are many situations where antibiotics are prescribed when they\u2019re not needed at all. That contributes to the worldwide epidemic of antibioticresistance<\/em>, may increase the risk for\u00a0diabetes<\/a>\u2014and, according to this study, may in some cases damage the digestive system in ways that can contribute to long-term health problems.<\/p>\n

So take \u2019em if you really need \u2019em. But never take them lightly\u2014and consider your alternatives<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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<\/a>SOURCE:<\/strong> Study titled \u201cSame Exposure but Two Radically Different Responses to Antibiotics: Resilience of the Salivary Microbiome versus Long-Term Microbial Shifts in Feces\u201d by researchers at University of Amsterdam, VU University Amsterdam, Swammerdam Institute for Life Sciences, The Netherlands, TNO Earth, Life and Social Sciences, The Netherlands, Karolinska University Hospital, Sweden, Helperby Therapeutics Limited, United Kingdom, UCL Institute of Child Health, United Kingdom and UCL Eastman Dental Institute, United Kingdom, published in the American Society for Microbiology’s journal MBio<\/em>.<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From Bottom Line Health How bad are antibiotics for your digestion and gut health, really? Here\u2019s the answer: Worse than you may have ever imagined. The latest study finds that the damage from certain common kinds of antibiotics may unsettle the beneficial bacteria in your gut for months, even a year\u2014in ways that could lead … Continue reading Alert: The Worst Antibiotics for Your Gut Health<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pmpro_default_level":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1839","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-for-your-body","pmpro-has-access"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4MGMb-tF","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1839"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1840,"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1839\/revisions\/1840"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1839"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1839"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/leadershipshape.com\/wardroom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1839"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}