Candida Test Kits - Biological Testing Service

By Christiane Pies, Head of Science at the Dr Hauss Laboratory
(translated into English by Ute Allison)

Currently probiotics are on everyone’s lips and foods with added probiotics have got increasingly popular in the past few years.
What is true about the colourful advertising promises and what do you have to consider when using probiotics?

Our intestine with a surface of more than 500 square meters is not only the place of digestion but also our most important immune organ. More than two thirds of our defence cells can be found there. Here, more often than not, a weak immune system, chronic infections, inflammation and allergies can make their start. Many people suffer from digestive problems like IBS, constipation or diarrhoea. Intestinal cancer is the second most frequent cancer in Germany and takes the life of about 30,000 people every year.

The resident beneficial bacteria, which we call the intestinal flora, is of enormous importance for our intestinal health.
From birth a newborn baby, who has lived in the sterile environment of the womb, gets into contact with the microbes of its environment. At this point the kind of birth will decide which kind of microbes will first colonise the baby. In natural birth the child will have contact to the skin and vaginal flora of its mother, whereas after a caesarean the ‘first settlers’ are usually hospital microbes. It is not rare that already at this point a succession of constantly relapsing respiratory infections, ear infections and allergies will start.
The diet in the first months also has an important influence on the intestinal flora.
Breast fed children host other bacteria than bottle fed ones. Mother milk also contains a multitude of immune molecules, which give invading bacteria a hard time. Bottle fed babies are lacking this “fortress” of defence.

A complete intestinal ecosystem has usually been established at the age of two.
Now about 400 different species of microbes inhabit the gut.
This gut flora consists of about 10,000 billion microbes (these are about 10 times as many cells as our body contains).
They keep our immune system busy and train it. 
Especially in modern times, when life is much cleaner than in those times when our immune system was developed, this training with the intestinal flora is more important than ever. A bored immune system will start to look for another sparring partner (for example allergens) to avoid being unemployed.

In the last 10 years prescriptions for antibiotics have multiplied by the factor 10, though the diseases, which are usually treated with antibiotics, have only doubled during this time. Antibiotics are very important in fighting bacterial infections and have saved countless people’s lives for many decades. It is a fact, however, that in Germany antibiotics are also prescribed in illnesses, which cannot be influenced by antibiotics - for example flu like infections.

Unfortunately antibiotics do not just kill the bacteria, which make us ill, but also the beneficial gut bacteria. Through this the body’s own defence system gets another setback and the immune function is clearly diminished. The next infection is basically pre-programmed.
To give the damaged gut flora and the weakened immune system a good head start
it is highly advisable to undertake a repopulation with Acidophilus and Bifidus, at least after the antibiotic therapy. This bacterial support can work wonders, particularly in children. More than half of all antibiotic prescriptions for nose and throat infections are issued for under 4 years olds. As a consequence many children contract allergies or even more infections – a vicious circle begins.
The re-colonisation of the gut flora can have a positive influence on a life long ‘allergy career’ for this group.
Finnish scientists who fed babies with lactobacilli for several months directly after birth achieved a fifty percent decrease in atopic eczema.

But not only antibiotics harm the intestinal ecosystem. Diet errors, stress and medication (cortisone, hormones, laxatives, pain killers) also cause harm in the intestine on long term. Many people eat too frequently, too fast, too much fat and not enough fibre. But it is the fibre, which supplies the good gut bacteria with nutrients. If they are malnourished, they disappear from the intestine and those bacteria, which can digest sweets and fats move in. The metabolism of these is rather unfavourable, however, and can damage the gut lining on long term as well as make way for inflammation, infections and allergies.

Today a great variety of food is on offer, advertising ‘with probiotics’ on the label. However, in contrary to good supplements, foods do not have to guarantee a long survival rate of their added bacteria. Bacteria in supplements have been chosen specifically for their special metabolic qualities and their good survival rates during their passage through the stomach and intestine. If you really want to change your inner ecosystem, it is certainly more advisable to go to your health food store than to the cooler cabinets of your supermarket.

Probiotics can help with the following:
- Keep the gut lining healthy
- Ease constipation
- Protect from allergies
- Protect from diarrhoea
- Protect from gut inflammation
- Protect from illness causing bacteria in the gut
- Protect from intestinal fungi (like candida)
- Strengthen the immune defence
- Protect from intestinal cancer
- Help detoxing
- Help with lactose intolerance

Reference: Darmgesund mit Probiotika, Dr. Michaela Doell, Herbig Verlag,
ISBN 978-3-7766-2543-1