Reddit reviews Nature’s Way Probiotic Pearls Acidophilus, 1 Billion Live Cultures, 30 Softgels (Packaging May Vary)

I want to debunk a couple of points in this article. This will be a long post, but I will provide light at the tunnel at the end. Please standby.

1. Prescript assist has 2 papers published from it. The total amount of people in both studies was 50. It doesnt say if that means 50 unique people or at worst case, 25 of the same people twice. As a researcher, the fact that the last paper was published on prescript assist was 2007 makes me skeptical.
   
   
2. Most probiotics get really good reviews on amazon. I have read hundreds of reviews. I also reviewed the reports on labdoor.com regarding the efficacy of many of these probiotics. There are several probiotics which are essentially placebo pills because they have a really low CFU, yet they have really good reviews on amazon. I believe this is related to the placebo affect.
   
   For example, Pearls have only 320 million CFU (most researchers agree you need at least 1 billion for a therapeutic dose) when tested via labdoor. Yet, they have a 4.5 star rating on amazon with 80+% being of a 4 star rating or better (over 1300 reviews). All of these people cannot be lying. My guess is its placebo effect. For comparison, Prescript assist has 80% of its users rating it more than 4 stars or better and a total of 377 reviews.
   
   sources:
   https://labdoor.com/review/enzymatic-therapy-acidophilus-pearls
   
   http://www.amazon.com/Enzymatic-Therapy-Acidophilus-Pearls-30/dp/B0013OOIOQ/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_2_a_it?ie=UTF8&qid=1458839257&sr=8-2-fkmr0&keywords=1++%2B+Like++-+Dislike++2+Enzymatic+Therapy+Acidophilus+Pearls
   
   http://www.amazon.com/Prescript-Assist-Probiotic-B0049NW9UI-Prescript-Assist/dp/B00JB2GOFI/ref=sr_1_1_s_it?s=hpc&ie=UTF8&qid=1458839414&sr=1-1&keywords=prescript+assist
   
   
3. The papers cited regarding acne, ABX, and IBD are presented much stronger in this article that the authors of the studies claim. For example, in one of hte papers, the authors explicitly say this:
   
   "We do not have a direct explanation as to why the exposure to tetracycline antibiotics might increase the risk of IBD nor do we have an explanation more specifically why exposure to doxycycline might increase the risk of CD. Clinical and bench science evidence does exist implicating a role of bacteria and/or previous antibiotic exposure in the pathogenesis of IBD and CD"
   
   Another paper says this:
   
   "The effect of ciprofloxacin on the gut microbiota was profound and rapid, with a loss of diversity and a shift in community composition
   occurring within 3–4 d of drug initiation. By 1 wk after the end of each course, communities began to return to their initial state, but the
   return was often incomplete. Although broadly similar, community changes after ciprofloxacin varied among subjects and between the
   two courseswithin subjects. In all subjects, the composition of the gut microbiota stabilized by the end of the experiment but was altered
   from its initial state. As with other ecosystems, the human distal gut microbiome at baseline is a dynamic regimen with a stable average
   state. Antibiotic perturbation may cause a shift to an alternative stable state, the full consequences of which remain unknown."
   
   In this paper here (http://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/gb-2014-15-7-r89), they argue, and reasonable well since they collected stools samples of 2 people daily for an entire year, that it doesnt matter so much the type of bacteria, but moreso the function, AND, several different populations of bacteria can have the same function. Therefore, you can't conclude that when your biome changes, it is permanently wrecked. It may not be wrecked at all. It might 2 sides of the same coin.
   
   The Silver Lining
   
   It would be unfruitful of me to simply point out all the things wrong with this article but not point you to good science so you have something to hang your hat on.
   
   Here is a great paper that done by some researchers at MIT. These guys submitted their stool daily for a year (over 700 samples) and kept a daily log of what they were doing. They were not shown their biome results until the study was over so they could not influence them.
   
   here is a great article telling the narrative of the paper:
   
   http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2014/09/these-two-guys-studied-their-feces-for-a-year/378862/
   
   Their scientific paper is here:
   
   http://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/gb-2014-15-7-r89
   
   The data they used for this study is also publicly available.
   
   Here is another great paper from Lawerence David's group: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24336217
   
   They show that diet can change biome rapidly and predictably. They also examined a few other biomarkers.