Prebiotics: The Current State-of-the-Science.

PREBIOTICS, 1995 – the concept was first explained by Dr. Marcel Roberfroid in a 1995 medical article where he introduced PREBIOTICS as unique plant fibers that have beneficial effects in the intestinal tract and the entire body. PREBIOTICS are not Probiotics.

Dr. Roberfroid offered a refined definition in the 2007 Journal of Nutrition stating:

“A prebiotic is a selectively fermented ingredient that allows specific changes, both in the composition and/or activity in the gastrointestinal microflora that confers benefits upon host well-being and health.”

PREBIOTICS, 2010 – Just 15 years later, Dr. Roberfroid and 20 other international health scholars published a state-of-the-art article on PREBIOTICS in the prestigious British Journal of Nutrition titled PREBIOTIC Effects: Metabolic and Health Benefits* . It is 63 pages long and has 463 references. In short, the science of PREBIOTICS have come of age.

The following benefits are detailed within the article in great depth. What is now proven in seven general areas of health are:

1. The bacteria within the lower gut are now recognized to be vitally important to attaining and maintaining a wide variety of health benefits, but only when PREBIOTICS significantly improve the digestive balance within this bacterial mix.
2. PREBIOTICS improve the function of the gut, including increased bulk, stool regularity and softness.
3. PREBIOTICS increase calcium and magnesium absorption throughout the colon. Greater bone density and strength have been shown.
4. PREBIOTICS increase certain hormones in the blood that produce a feeling of satiety or fullness. They are associated with weight loss in animals.
5. PREBIOTICS enhance immunity in the gut and body beginning on the day of birth when a mother feeds her baby with her own prebiotic laden breast milk.
6. PREBIOTICS alter the bacterial mix in a way that strengthens the colon’s wall, and so reduces the movement of toxins into the blood. It improves a “leaky gut”.
7. PREBIOTICS reduce intestinal infection because they promote the growth of good bacteria, which crowd out the bad ones.

The above seven are pretty well proven and supported by the medical literature. But, there are other areas where PREBIOTICS are felt to be tentatively supportive of health benefits. These are:

1. PREBIOTICS may reduce obesity, type 2 diabetes and the associated condition called metabolic syndrome.
2. PREBIOTICS may reduce the risk and/or improvement of intestinal inflammation such as inflammatory bowel disease (ulcerative colitis, Crohn’s disease and pouchitis).
3. PREBIOTICS may reduce the risk of colon polyps and cancer.

Wow! Were a pill developed that did these above 10 things there would be a Nobel prize for the inventor and a monumental world-wide demand for the product. Yet, we all have within us the capacity to obtain each of these goals.

The three main PREBIOTICS readily available to everyone are:

• Inulin – extracted commercially from chicory root and Jerusalem artichoke root.
• Oligofructose – extracted and derived commercially from chicory root and Jerusalem artichoke root
• FOS (fructo-oligosaccharide) – derived from sucrose or table sugar.

PREBIOTIN is a carefully blended mix of inulin and oligofructose, each of which nourishes the good bacteria in selective parts of the colon. Together, they provide our full-spectrum prebiotic, PREBIOTIN.

* Roberfroid M, Gibson GR et al. Prebiotic effects: metabolic and health benefits. Br J Nutr 2010 Aug; 104 Suppl 2:S1-63.