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How to restore intestinal flora, and what happens if you don't?

If you see a thirty something man with gray hair, or a forty year old woman with balding head, or a fifty year old stroke victim in a coffin, or a sixty-five year old grandpa with shaking hands, or a seventy year old grandma with dementia — look no further than inside their compromised guts.

You see, besides making passable stools, gut bacteria also synthesize vitamins B-7 (biotin), B-12, and K. The deficiency of these essential vitamins contributes to diabetes, obesity, hair loss, gray hair, eczema, seborrhea, anemia, internal bleedings, ulcers, strokes, cancers, degenerative disorders such as Parkinson and Alzheimer disease, and common gastrointestinal, respiratory, and autoimmune disorders.

Healthy intestinal flora is also vital for prevention of constipation, for maintaining your primary immunity (phagocytosis), for shielding your large intestine from colon cancer, and for averting yeast infection inside your mouth or vagina.

Miralax Safety Alert

After bacteria inside the gut are killed by antibiotics, laxatives, heavy metals, surgeries, and colonoscopies, fiber is broadly recommended to replace bacteria and form stools, otherwise they turn into grayish rock-hard pebbles, and turn a routine trip to the bathroom into a torture. This condition is called dysbacteriosis or dysbiosis.

Unlike live bacteria, the dead cells of plants — which is what fiber is — can't perform bacterial functions, essential for humans. The loss of these functions contributes to impaired immunity, diabetes, obesity, hair loss, eczema, seborrhea, anemia, internal bleedings, ulcers, strokes, cancers, and common gastrointestinal, respiratory, and autoimmune disorders.

Despite all of these well known and thoroughly studied facts, the American medical establishment adamantly refuses to recognize the role of intestinal flora in health and longevity, and does everything possible to obliterate bacteria, starting at birth. Then, it profits enormously from treating the resulting diseases.

Reader's testimonial

I found your website 3 years ago because of constant constipation even when eating vegetables, fruit etc., and was scheduled for my second colonoscopy. After reading all your information I have been taking probiotics with every meal and am amazed at the ease of passing bowel movements... and EVERY DAY! Thank You for the website!" E.-J., Canada (via e-mail)

I can't fathom the half genocidal, half suicidal, and 100% negligent attitude because it's an open secret among medical professionals that dysbacteriosis harms patients, particularly children and seniors, who are the most vulnerable. Children — because of their dysbacteriosis-related diarrhea and underdeveloped immunity. Seniors — because of practically all age-related diseases, impaired immunity, and antibiotic resistance. That's the genocidal aspect of this travesty.

And, yes, dysbacteriosis harms doctors, nutritionists, dietitians, pharmacists, and microbiologists just as ruthlessly. In fact, it harms more medical professionals and their family members than the general public, because they are more likely to use fiber and antibiotics for themselves and their families, indiscriminately. That's the suicidal aspect of this unfathomable “fiasco of judgment” and, perversely, poetic justice.

The perils of dysbacteriosis are well known to anyone who has ever seen Activia's ads, or visited a health food store, or perused the Internet's health sites, or attended medical school. Ignoring the role of dysbacteriosis in health and/or death is the negligence aspect of this story — the mainstream American doctors don't look for it, don't diagnose it, and don't treat it.

There isn't, for example, a single reference in The Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy either about “dysbacteriosis” or “dysbiosis.” And there is only a single reference to the term “microbiota” -- an umbrealla medical term for intestinal bacteria. It is used only once in relationship to the “Clostridium difficile Induced Diarrhea” article [1]

This isn't surprising — the negligent attitude towards this condition encourages the indiscriminate use of antibiotics and fiber from the cradle to the grave.

Fiber, in essence, was embraced and promoted by Big Pharma as a cheap and expedient antidote to expensive and overprescribed antibiotics. Since Merck and its brethren can't sell “bugs” with an enormous profit reserved for patented drugs, why bother ruining an enormously profitable antibiotics franchise?

The disregard of dysbacteriosis has also been fueling an epidemic of colorectal disorders of immense proportion for some time, including colorectal cancers. It is also behind the proliferation of deadly antibiotic-resistant bacteria (superbugs), and dysbacteriosis-related complications, that are propelling the costs of health care into the stratosphere, increasing mortality, and lowering life-expectancy.

All along, those who are empowered to force change — from the Surgeon General of the United States to the National Institutes of Health, from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to the American Gastroenterological Association — keep 'mum' even though intestinal flora, just like the blood, is considered a fully-fledged organ in its own right, and that much is taught in medical schools everywhere: [2]

Whereas the stomach and upper small intestine are essentially sterile, the bacteria count rises further along the intestine, with a steep rice by a factor of 10,000-100,00 at the ileocecal valve. The number of bacteria per ml of chyme rises from 10^6 in the ileum to 10^11 -12^12 (Fig. 29-40). Most of the bacteria in the colon are obligate anaerobes: Bifidus and Bacteriocide (gram-positive or –negative nonsporulating bacilli). Aerobic forms such as E. coli, enterococci and lactobaccilli account for less than 1% of the total bacteria count. There are over 400 species of bacteria in the colon; bacteria make up 30-50% of the total dry matter in the feces, or even 75% according to other calculations [42].”

How can it be — intestinal bacteria are an essential part of human biology, but dysbacteriosis isn't recognized? This is very much like saying that there are no toothless people in the United States because all people without teeth wear dentures.

This tragic farce reminds me of the not-so-distant practice of bloodletting (phlebotomy) to alleviate a high fever. Countless millions of people, George Washington among them, had died from this barbaric 'treatment' because there was a universal belief among doctors that the body can easily replace lost blood. Come the 21st century, they still believe that fiber from dead plants can replace 400 species of once live bacteria.

What are the causes of dysbacteriosis?

Well, anything that kills bad bacteria also kills good bacteria, which are identical single-cell living organisms, albeit better behaving. Here‘s just a brief list of the most egregious villains. You will not find any particular recommendations here, because they‘re self-evident: don‘t use fiber, avoid antibiotics, remove amalgam fillings, use natural soaps, etc. Here we go:

As you can see, a lot of things, particularly the ones that make a bundle of money for someone without any scruples, have a greater than great potential for killing the bugs inside your gut, ruining your good looks, and dispatching you to the grave.

How to determine if you are affected by dysbacteriosis?

Advised by their veterinarians, farmers pay big bucks for bacterial supplements imported from Europe to keep their farm animals well and productive, because nobody will buy a bloated, underweight, sickly calf that‘s suffering from chronic diarrhea and digestive distress.

Well, dysbacteriosis in humans isn‘t any more difficult to spot than it is in livestock. Here are the telltale signs of this condition:

Keep in mind that any one of these signs may indicate other conditions. It‘s always best to consult a caring, competent physician and ask him or her to arrange for a comprehensive digestive stool analysis (CDSA) at a medical lab.

How to improve intestinal flora inside your gut?

Eliminating dysbacteriosis literally means “infecting,” or, as a microbiologist might say, reinoculating your large intestine with synergistic bacterial strains. In practical terms, it means that you need to take a quality pre- and probiotics, such as Enterophilus, which I specifically developed for this purpose.

Supplemental probiotics are the most accessible, inexpensive, and easiest form of oral bacterial therapy. You can take these supplements continuously, periodically, or on an as-needed basis, relying on your observations of stools and other symptoms of dysbacteriosis as described here and in my books.

The Enterophilus is recommended for all dysbacteriosis-related conditions. These include chronic constipation,  bloating, diarrhea, irritable bowel disease, diverticulosis, depressed immunity, chronic fatigue, anemia, infertility, amenorrhea, acne, hair loss, graying hair, premature aging, prediabetes, diabetes, neurological damage  intestinal disorders, oral sores, asthma, acne, seborrhea, respiratory and urogenital infections, recurring vaginal and oral yeast infections, complications from infectious diseases, cancers, radio- and chemo- therapy, antibiotics and antiviral treatments, and after heavy metal poisoning—such as lead or mercury from amalgam fillings.

The Enterophilus is helpful while breastfeeding and during restrictive weight loss diets, such as the Atkins diet, because it prevents constipation, and eliminates the risk of undernutrition or malnutrition from damaging your eyes, hearing, skin, bones, teeth, hair, and nails.

If you are suffering from chronic constipation, hemorrhoidal disease, incomplete emptying, then restoring anorectal sensitivity should be your next goal. Please continue reading the How to restore anorectal sensitivity page to learn how.

Author's note

American dentists are well aware of the amalgam fillings controversy. You aren't likely to find any such fillings in their own teeth, or in the teeth of their children and spouses. Many no longer use amalgams to avoid exposure.

If you have any “black” fillings, get them replaced with composite fillings. Do it for the same reasons you don‘t want mercury in your fish, or lead in your kitchen pipes, or arsenic in your drinking water.

If your dentist tries to talk you out of it — and he or she may for legal reasons — then ask another dentist to do it for cosmetic reasons. Dentists may lose their licenses for replacing a viable filling “without cause” because it's construed as profiteering and malpractice.

When you ask dentists to do the same procedure for cosmetic reasons, or to get rid of a metallic taste in your mouth, that's okay. Hence the charade. Health concerns aren't a good enough “cause” because state licensing boards play along with the ADA's position — amalgams represent zero risk.

If you work in the same office with a person who has amalgam fillings, your exposure to mercury vapors from a breathing person may be similar or higher than from a poorly collected spill from a broken mercury thermometer.

If you would like to learn more about this subject, Amalgam Illness, Diagnosis and Treatment by Dr. Andrew Hall Cutler provides comprehensive information on all issues related to dental amalgams. It's expensive, but worth it.

Let others know about this page! This link may save a life!

Konstantin Monastyrsky

Footnotes

1 “Clostridium difficile Induced Diarrhea” article [link]

2 R.F. Schmidt, G. Thews. Colonic Motility. Human Physiology, 2nd edition. 29.7:733.

3 American Dental Association. “ADA continues to believe that amalgam is a valuable, viable and safe choice for dental patients and concurs with the findings of the U.S. Public Health Service that amalgam has ‘continuing value in maintaining oral health.’» ADA Statement on Dental Amalgam, Revised January 8, 2002; [link]

4 Mercury Compounds. U.S. Environmental Protection Agency; [link]