- Look down at your arm.
They're on you right now.
In fact, they're everywhere.
On your skin, in your mouth, on your teeth,
just crawling, breathing, and farting all over the place.
- Aw, come on!
- Relax.
I'm just talking about bacteria,
and I know reflexively you're thinking,
well, bacteria, that must be a bad thing.
Not really.
You have more good bacteria than bad bacteria in your body.
Our bodies are home to over 100 trillion good bacteria,
well over 1,000 species, and somewhere
between seven to 9,000 strains of these species.
Not only are these bacteria good for us,
but they're practically essential to our survival.
This symbiotic relationship between
us humans and good bacteria's known as mutualism,
and it's basically when both parties are benefiting
from living together or existing together.
If you ever seen a rhino with a little bird sitting
on top of its back, it's called an oxpecker bird.
That bird is eating ticks
and parasites off the rhino's back.
So the bird is benefiting because it's getting fed.
The rhino's benefiting 'cause it's getting
less ticks and parasites on its back.
Everybody's winning.
(screams excitedly)
The type of good bacteria I wanna talk
about today lives primarily within your gut,
and you've heard the term, probiotic.
It's become a mega industry, into the hundred-billions
of people selling supplements,
selling foods that are probiotic-rich.
But do we really know what the term probiotic means?
Probiotics are live microorganisms,
basically bacteria and sometimes yeast,
that gives some sort of positive health benefit
to the person taking them.
In order for me to best explain how probiotics work,
we need to understand how the gut works.
Now, the job of the gut, and we're talking
about the small intestine and large intestine,
is to extract energy from foods,
absorb certain nutrients, like vitamins,
minerals, and really get rid of the waste.
When you're taking probiotics the majority
of the probiotics end up in the end
of your intestinal system, also know as the colon.
Found within your GI track or your gut is
something known as a microbiome.
This is the ecosystem that contains bacteria, fungi.
Those things are actually essential to your survival,
because unfortunately your digestive system can't extract
all the necessary nutrients from
all the different types of foods you're consuming.
So when we're talking about the good bacteria
within your gut, we're actually talking
about the bacteria that's helping
you get some of the nutrients from your food
to improve your body's immune function,
to support the integrity of the wall of your intestines.
This is the job of the good bacteria.
- I just wanted to say
thanks, partner.
- Our knowledge and the majority of the research done
on the microbiome is fairly new,
with the majority of the studies popping
up in the last 20 years.
Within this recent research we found
that the gut microbiome is incredibly important
to our health, but we don't totally understand it just yet.
We've seen relationships between irregularities
in the microbiome and diseases
like diabetes, obesity, heart disease,
mental conditions like depression, anxiety.
But it's really a cause-and-effect dilemma.
Basically the chicken or the egg.
We're not sure what came first,
the irregularities of the microbiome
or the illnesses themselves.
The gut-mind connection is what truly gets me excited.
Just imagine this for a second.
The bacteria found within your gut can be controlling
your emotions, your depressive,
anxiety symptoms, your moods, your appetite even.
That's what preliminary research is showing.
After hearing the links of all these serious diseases
and the gut-mind connection,
you probably wanna keep your microbiome
as healthy and diverse as possible.
So how do we do that?
Well, first of all, you wanna focus on your diet.
No surprise here.
Focus on eating vegetables, whole grains, legumes.
These are fiber-rich foods.
Fiber-rich foods are basically known as prebiotics,
as they serve as food for the probiotics.
Next you wanna consume probiotic-rich foods
like yogurt, sauerkraut, kimchi.
These foods naturally contain that good bacteria
we've been talking about.
I know some people resort to taking probiotic supplements,
but I'll touch on that shortly.
Now, there have been ways that
you can actually hurt your microbiome.
First and foremost is a diet rich in refined carbohydrates.
I'm talking about white breads, white pasta,
white rice, sugars, even artificial sweeteners.
Next up is bad sleep.
If you don't get enough sleep,
I've talked about the consequences of that in the past,
but it also hurts your microbiome.
'Cause guess what.
The bacteria in your gut also have a circadian rhythm.
They like for you to get quality sleep.
Next is antibiotics.
When you use antibiotics inappropriately
or you overuse them, you actually kill
off that good bacteria in your gut
and you can create an overgrowth of harmful bacteria.
Last, but not least, is stress.
Yep, those folks who are more stressed out
and experience chronic stress for an extended period
of time have a disruption of their microbiome,
both with higher amounts of bad bacteria
and lower amounts of good bacteria.
- Stop
getting
worked up
over
small things.
- Now, probiotic supplements.
Multi-billion dollar industry.
Marketers are quick to make health claims
about the benefits of taking their supplements,
but in reality the picture is so much more complex.
Like I said earlier, there's seven
to 9,000 different strains
of good bacteria inside your gut.
Increasing the number of a specific strain can have
different impacts depending on which condition you have.
Probiotics in general are considered a safe supplement,
but there are harms and they do exist,
especially if you have a weakened immune system
or you have certain illnesses like cancer.
There's been a recent study that came
out of Israel showing that taking probiotics can
actually harm your microbiome,
depending on which probiotic you take.
My recommendation when it comes to probiotic supplements is
that the average healthy person should
not be taking a daily probiotic.
It hasn't been proven to give enough benefit
to warrant the risks, and especially spending money
on a supplement that may not give
you any benefit whatsoever.
Now, the conditions where I have seen evidence
to prove that there exists a benefit is
in traveler's diarrhea, antibiotic-associated diarrhea,
very specific conditions known as necrotizing enterocolitis
in young children, last but not least,
those who have inflammatory bowel disease
like ulcerative colitis.
Notice that these are very specific instances
where I reach for probiotics as a possible treatment option.
For those of you considering starting to take a probiotic,
first and foremost, please have a conversation
with your doctor or health professional
on whether or not you should be actually doing this.
Next I want you to not skip proven treatments
for your condition and instead go for unproven treatments.
Make sure you pay attention to the label.
There are a few things to look out for.
One, the expiration date and storage instructions.
Second, look at the CFUs.
That's the colony-forming units.
Look for a number bigger or at five billion.
And finally look to get enteric-coated probiotics
because those are less likely to get destroyed
by the acid in your stomach.
The future of probiotics
and even probiotic supplements is very interesting.
The potential for unlocking so
many new health secrets is really immense.
I'm excited about it.
You should be excited about it.
That's why I'm gonna be linking some further reading
down below in the description.
Please dive in and check out the articles
that I'm recommending.
Jump into my comments section.
If you have any questions about anything I've said here,
if you have any comments or some stories
you'd like for me to share, write it down below
because I'm interested in what you have to say.
And as always, stay happy and healthy.
Think about those red-billed oxpeckers (chuckles).
So when we're talking about the good bacteria
inside your gut, ew.
Do you mind?
It's a probiotic thing.
So this is actually,
maybe you have good bacteria in your mouth.
How much bigger is he than me?
It's pretty crazy, no?
(scoffs)
(downtempo music)