Forget What You Know About Probiotics - A Paradigm Shift

Much of the probiotic market was built on assumptions and hypotheses of how the gut functions. With the $157 million NIH Human Microbiome Project dramatically changing our understanding of the gut in the last 5 years, we have come to discover that the assumptions and hypotheses under which the vast majority of probiotic products are formulated are simply false. We have a paradigm shift in our understanding of probiotic therapy. This talk will discuss details of the new understanding of the human microbiome and how it specifically relates to health, including spectrum disorders. We ARE 10x more bacteria than we are human; bacteria that live in and on us play a significant role in how our body responds to stress, food, and our environment. Our microbes control many of our behaviors and can even influence what we eat. Recent research suggests an association between gut dysbiosis and onset of autism spectrum disorder. Physician-supervised protocols using probiotic strains that alleviate dysbiosis have resulted in corresponding reports of clinical improvement of symptoms in children.