I have been wondering about the role of biofilms recently, since I read this link Zizzle posted in the last couple of weeks:
http://www.endfatigue.com/health_articl ... litis.html
What caught my eye was this throwaway sentence at the end:
That Pepto Bismol works (helped in 100% of the cases with none of the placebo group benefitting) raises the question of the role of Biofilm infections, in collagenous colitis. Biofilm infections respond poorly to antibiotics but are very sensitive to the Bismuth found in Pepto Bismol.
Maybe that's why Pepto works for those who can tolerate it - and why it stops working, if no further action is taken to protect good flora, or re-establish them, or kill the baddies that are disrupted from biofilm?... and maybe a non-salicylate bismuth formulation would benefit those who can't tolerate Pepto? Like this one, which isn't available in the U.S.:
http://www.medsafe.govt.nz/consumers/cmi/d/de-nol.htm (I found two other bismuth subcitrate medications - one contains metronidazole and tetracycline, and the other ranitidine - admittedly I don't know much about looking up meds, there may be others.)
I was curious about medication, because it seems as though it might be a way to achieve some of the Pepto benefits, without the salicylate problems. I'm not suggesting that bismuth is safe over a long period of time - I think it's still a short-course round of treatment.
And then, of course, once the pathogenic organisms that have been living in biofilms are detached from their polymerized hold on the gut (and/or other tissues), and on the loose, what would be my plan for killing, eliminating, or replacing them? The complex and inter-dependent list of variables about what conditions favor which bacterial populations seems unaskable, much less answerable. I am pretty confused, as you can tell.
I can say that my mother's recurrent C. difficile infections were stopped when I added probiotics to her regimen, and that at least one type of probiotic was useless. Whether the probiotics disrupted the spore-producing C. diff bugs from succeeding in their reproductive cycle, and eventually eliminated the "spore bank" - or whether they outcompeted for living space in her body? - or some third thing? No idea.
I would love an expanded understanding of this - are there biofilms that are beneficial, and would bismuth disrupt those to the detriment of the human host???
I know this biofilms thing is just a footnote on the larger discussion - but there they are, hiding out, an inaccessible to testing or treatment.
Love,
Sara
