Kickas.org Forums Ankylosing Spondylitis General Discussion #1 AS Web Support Group New read from nature on Gut Bacteria and AS

Good stuff. Here is the partial. I might buy the entire article though


http://www.nature.com/nm/journal/v17/n9/pdf/nm0911-1055.pdf

Warning this is a PDF

Now they just need to label those red things with squiggly tails so the docs can identify what exactly is the trigger!

thanks for this.

Very interesting. I used to have ulcerative colitis and that is when I was first diagnosed with A.S. The colitis has been in remission for 21 year's but I came out of remission almost 8 year's ago.
Pea

interesting article. i got the full pdf with my university library account so i can email it to you if you want it. concludes with "Further understanding of these immune pathways would allow design of new drugs for treatment of gut and joint disorders." i guess that is understandable since both authors work for Merck Laboratories. not trying to jump all over the anti-corporate bandwagon or anything but if they think that "therapeutic manipulation of resident bacteria may be a way to tackle rheumatic disease" then surely diet is worthy of a brief mention.

while not having IBD, do have IBS and inflammation of the illeum, and read that that is a symptom of the spondys (even if one is gastrointestinally symptom free). my current rheumy believes all spondys? inflammatory arthritises? start in the gut.

Hi drizzit,

Here's a 'partial' along similar lines.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/art.30558/abstract

It points out that recent meetings of established rheumatological groups 'does not include mention of the role of endogenous flora in the pathogenesis of disease'.

The relationship between spondyarthropathy and bacterial flora 'is becoming more apparent'.

'The authors hypothesise that HLA B27 influences the composition of the body's endogenous flora and that this 'B27-shaped flora' causes ankylosing spondylitis'.

'Ideally the hypothesis should be testable, but the very complexity of the bacterial genome hosted by each of us makes this test a daunting task'.

It's estimated that there are upto 1200 bacterial species capable of residing in the gut. Each of us may carry something like 400 or 500 species.

For Crohn's disease (often AS associated) it's well known that patients have much less diversity of bacterial species than normal patients. Put another way - only a relatively few bacterial species dominate!

So does a taking a pro-biotic regularly help?

Hello, Raw:



Probably not very much at all--if that is all You are doing.

HEALTH,
John

it did make a world of difference for my intestinal problems.

prior to starting probiotics, i was more and more often having bouts (for months at a time) of unexplained constipation with mucus. unexplained meaning: getting tons of fiber, drinking lots of water, getting plenty of exercise. magnesium helped a little, but not enough. psyllium was required.

a colonoscopy showed inflammation in my ileum. stool sample testing showed i had no detectable lactobacilli.

so i take lactobacilli. and within a few days i was regular again, and have remained essentially so for about 5 months now if memory serves me correctly.

we'll see how much this helps the arthritis.

as john said, in addition, i do other things as well for the arthritis.

but yes, for me, the probiotics really made the GI stuff miraculously better.