Seeking Recommendations for Quality Probiotics

Anyone have a recommendation for a quality probiotic? I know there's a lot of them on the market. And if somebody's getting good results from a particular probiotic, that might be helpful.

Thanks

Chris

Hi C,

My gastroenterologist just gave me a list of the ones she prefers a few months ago. I'll dig it up later and let you know. My former dietician, whom I'm still friends with, always recommended Culturelle (sp?), which is what I use now. Actually, I buy the Walmart clone of Culturelle for a lot less money because obviously I'm a cheap bastard. The other one that I used previously, also with good results, was Align. You can now also find probiotics mixed into many foods, such as yogurts, but I'm not sure if the amount in each product is significant enough to be helpful. Not saying it's not, just saying I don't know.

I guess the important question is what type of improvement would you expect to see to indicate they're working specifically for you, and again not sure how to answer that for everyone. For me, I look at my ability to gain weight as a sign that things are improved relative to my bowels. So what might be a "good" indicator for me might mean nothing to folks with more bowel. Probably a good question for your gastroenterologist or dietician. I'll look for that list when I get some time later today.

Regards,

Bob

I had a lot of trouble with gas, so I started using a probiotic many years ago, and it really helped reduce the gas my gut produced - that's how I judged it was working. I had tried several different ones, with varying success, and now stick with American Health brand chewable Acidophilus and Bifidum, because they worked the best. Used to find it at Kroger, but they stopped carrying it for some reason, so I order it online from Vitacost.

Good luck to you.

Hi Chris. I have been doing probiotics ever since I found out that is why I have this ostomy. It was the antibiotics that caused this. I have been doing some research and think that the probiotics that have prebiotics with them are the best. Because the prebiotics feed the probiotics and I think it gives them a better chance to live. Sorry about all the bad spelling. My spell check will not work on this page.

Yeah, Blujay is spot-on... prebiotics should always be recommended with probiotics... I'm struggling to understand why they are not. Here's a quick explanation for anyone interested.

https://www.mayoclinic.org/prebiotics-probiotics-and-your-health/art-20390058

Regards,

Bob

These are two wonderful recommendations, they sure know their stuff. Culturelle and Align are, as Bob pointed out, the best out there. Culturelle claims their probiotics are more likely to survive. I am about to switch to Culturelle.

You can get both at Costco at a much reduced price, probably similar to Walmart.

I also take the chewing probio from Costco. Their own Truenature brand, it is wonderful and I pay only 18 dollars for one hundred and eighty chewables.

I have a burning sensation on my left lower abdomen that is very painful and makes digestion also very painful. I have suffered with this for thirty years. Had I found probiotics, this surgery would never have happened. Probiotics would have made all the difference.

I went to a hundred doctors explaining the pain over the years, not one of them recommended it. Even as I suffered severe colon infections, they still did not recommend it. That is to show you how doctors are corporate dispensers of pharmaceutical corporations. Eventually, the infections of my lower abdomen started to affect my colon.

I thought probiotics were a sham, just one more health claim to sell products. Doctors refused to dispense antibiotics for my severe pain when it flared up. Until I landed in the hospital, my digestive system shut down. The doctors argued with me for over two years that antibiotics would not work because it was impossible I had bacteria building in my gut. Until I almost died in the emergency room.

Two hours after taking antibiotics, my digestive system started to work again. The doctors were surprised or shocked to say the least. They are idiots. Their idiocy almost killed me. In a visit after this episode, the nurse recommended I get a treatment done by injecting good bacteria. I have awesome insurance but I will not fly to LA for a year for this. So, she said I should take probiotics. This was a year ago.

I was desperate so I went to Costco and bought Align along with their own brand Truenature chewables. After thirty years of suffering with this horrible condition, the pain stopped a few days after I started taking these supplements. Had I known this thirty years ago, I would still be whole.

I am not sure Align is that effective. I ran out of the Costco chewables for a while on a business trip, and the pain came back even though I was still taking the Align. That made me wonder if Align was really helping me. I went to Costco as soon as I got back, bought the chewables and the pain subsided. I think the chewables are more effective. I will switch to Culturelle because it is cheaper than Align and now that Bob vouched for it, I will try it. It looks quite convincing, their package and description. I was ambivalent but now I will for sure give it a try. I may even try the cheaper brand at Walmart, thanks to Bob for that advice, these things are expensive.

It is hard to believe these things could be so effective for a condition so severe, really hard to believe. I thought for years probiotics were pure bullshit, until they changed my life. I do everything now without pain and eat without pain. So, for anyone out there doubting the power of these silly pills/chewables, I got a story to tell you.

I wanted to leave a comment regarding Bluejay's comment.

He is right, the worst thing you can do is take antibiotics. Due to a good contract, I moved to South Texas years ago. I lived in one of these dystopian cities in that area. The health system is and was terrible, terrible doctors, even though I had great insurance.

In one of my lower abdomen flare-ups, a nurse in one of these terrible hospitals recommended I take Cipro. Cipro is as close as you are going to get to chemotherapy. Doctors do not like prescribing it because this antibiotic basically kills everything in its path, kills the good along with the bad, scorch-earth treatment.

Since that day, every time I had a flare-up which got to be almost constant, the doctors there had no problems prescribing it. I was not aware of how potentially lethal taking antibiotics was, and especially Cipro being a very potent but destructive antibiotic.

After the ostomy surgery, the flare-ups got masked by all kinds of adverse conditions that came with the surgery.

When I got back to Seattle, the doctors at the prestigious UWA medical center were horrified I had been prescribed these antibiotics for so many years, they were dumbfounded and almost incredulous. They were so shocked they got my records from Texas to find out, and sure enough, doctors there had prescribed Cipro indiscriminately for years.

The doctors could not say due to legal reasons, but their faces said it all, shock. They could not say Cipro cost me this condition. A brave nurse could not hold her shock and sense of discomfort knowing this, that in one visit, with an upset face told me that Cipro is why I have an ostomy.

In Seattle, however, they refused to give me Cipro arguing there was no way I was producing bad bacteria. The flare-ups continued, the surgery did not do anything to alleviate it. In other words, the surgery did not fix anything.

After a very serious visit to the ER, the doctor here relented and gave me Cipro, I was in pretty bad shape. It worked. But then they advised me on probiotics saying, rightly so, that taking Cipro was not healthy and could lead to even more problems.

Probiotics worked and now I lead a wonderful life. The point is that if the doctors had tried to find out why I was having this pain to begin with, and had they cared to advise me on natural alternatives instead of giving me such dangerous medicine, I would be without a stoma now.

Medicine works until you have a condition that they cannot find in their books. As long as you have something they have studied, you are fine. The moment you have something they do not know, watch out. To this day, they do not know why I have this pain in my abdomen, why I am producing negative bacteria. What I know is that probiotics cure me on a daily basis and allow me to lead a positive life.

I have lost much faith in the medical industry, to say the least. Their ignorance, which is very large, and their refusal to discuss alternative treatments, organic, wholesome such as probiotic, and their insane tendency to think very narrowly and interpret everything so narrowly makes the profession suffer from negligence and shows how indentured they are to corporate pharmaceuticals.

Curious,

Wow......I just read your last 2 posts above and am shell shocked! Although our specifics are different, you explained exactly how I feel/felt about the medical profession just a few years ago. I still feel that way, but have since stepped back and now look at the medical profession through an even wider lens. When you do that, the points you made about doctors' mindsets and how they are trained to treat disease change from being deplorable and difficult to understand to still deplorable but understandable. Don't read that as me taking their side in any way, I'm just saying that what they do and why they do it is explainable and predictable. It's not right, but it's the way the medical world works. And knowing that gives us patients a very powerful tool in our battle to stay alive as long as possible. Unfortunately, most folks who realize what's really going on and how modern medicine really works have to have been chewed up by the medical machine, such as we have, and have learned from our mistakes. Like you, if I could go back in time knowing what I know now about the medical industry, I wouldn't be as fked up as I am today. But we can't do that. So the next best thing is to help others not make the same mistakes we did, and that's hard to do. We're up against an unstoppable monstrosity in the medical industry. I could sit here and write about all this for hours......but you know where I'm coming from........so my time would be better spent responding to others needing help. But I hope folks read your last 2 posts and understand what you're saying. Thanks for posting that.

Regards,

Bob

I'm actually on Cipro now for an abscess infection caused by infected mesh. I'm scheduled to have it removed in 45 days.

Hi Cp,

Yup... Cipro is a frontline general antibiotic that all docs use that packs a pretty good punch. I'd bet everyone on here has been on it at some point. It does tend to kill everything, including the good bacteria. I guess the good news is you're not on Clindamycin, which has the highest rate of C-Diff infection... which can easily kill you. Dosage and duration are key.

Regards,

Bob

Cplumber Minnesota
United States Private Message
Reply by Cplumber, on Tue Jan 07, 2020 8:08 pm
I'm actually on Cipro now for an abscess infection caused by infected mesh. I'm scheduled to have it removed in 45 days.

Cipro is a wonderful drug, believe it or not. It has saved thousands, if not more, from certain death. Here in Seattle, it is a drug of last resort to be used very carefully, and whose effects on the patient have to be monitored constantly. nbsp

I was indiscriminately prescribed Cipro for every flare-up for three years, at the end of which I lost a part of my body. I had never heard about Cipro until I moved to that region. For 27 years doctors here did not prescribe it, not even mentioned in the slightest. My flare-ups were six months apart before Cipro, after three years my flare-ups were monthly, first, and then at the end before this tragedy, my symptoms were constant. nbsp

Reason is, the bad bacteria builds resistance over time. Right before the surgery, Cipro was working only slightly. Eventually, the pain that was only in the lower abdomen moved to the colon. Not only did I build resistance to the drug, but now because my immune system was weakened due to such extreme prescriptions, what was once in the abdomen only, nbsp; now moved to the colon. Being prescribed this drug constantly for three years began to destroy my internal organs. nbsp

Cipro is to be used very carefully and for short periods of time. That drug demands respect. When you have a life or death situation, Cipro is the cavalry, the Ghengis Khan of antibiotics, even though Bob mentioned an even more lethal antibiotic in his post, at least one of the most potent. nbsp

After doing much research, I realized that this malpractice nbsp; cost me my colon, so I started to research after the nurse here in Seattle nbsp;mentioned why I had this ostomy and found out that it is crazy to prescribe this drug so freely and indiscriminately so often and for so long. It borders on criminal. nbsp

As I age, when I have a serious infection, and I will, illness comes with age, they are going to have to find super strong antibiotics. After so many years of this drug, my body is now resistant to strong antibiotics. The bad bacteria build their own defenses, so Probiotics, thank God it is there, and natural. I have a surgery coming up, hospitals are filled with deadly bacteria and viruses these days that kill thousands every year and it is getting worse because doctors prescribe these drugs indiscriminately and the population has by now built up defenses internally and their immune systems are therefore weakened. If I get an infection, thanks to these doctors' malpractice, at the very least I will have a harder time combating it, and in the very worst scenario, now I am going into the battle weakened already. I must now share this with doctors for whatever surgery I have so they know in case I get an infection, they are gonna have to come cocked and loaded to the max, and be ready for a battle. nbsp

Bob's advice is great, I need to develop a wider angle to look at this thing, but it takes time. It's only been a year since I have found a cure for this and stopped suffering from this pain thanks to the probiotics. nbsp

My last post about this topic, bottom line is indiscriminate prescription of these drugs simply because they do not understand a condition and are too lazy and narrow-minded to consider other options, is currently killing thousands in the hospitals. nbsp

Best wishes to you. nbsp