Benefits
Benefits of FMT include the restoration of the colonic microbiota to its natural state by replacing missing Bacteroidetes and Firmicutes species, eradication of C. difficile, and resolution of clinical symptoms such as diarrhea, cramping and urgency. Antibiotic resistance in CDI is an uncommon event- rather CDI relapses due to the presence of C. difficile spores.
Although once considered to be "last resort therapy" by some medical professionals due to its unusual nature and 'invasiveness' compared with antibiotics; perceived potential risk of infection transmission; and lack of Medicare coverage for donor stool, the recent position statement by specialists in infectious diseases and other societies is moving away from FMT as a last-resort treatment and toward acceptance of FMT as standard therapy for relapsing CDI and also Medicare coverage in the United States. Dr Martin Floch, the Editor-In-Chief of the Journal of Clinical Gastroenterology, announced in a recent editorial that "FMT using donor stool has arrived as a successful therapy".
Given that antibiotics are the original cause of CDI through their damage of the normal human flora and removal of protective Bacteroidetes and Firmicutes species further antibiotic therapy should be avoided. It has now been recommended that endoscopic Fecal Microbiota Transplantation be elevated to first-line treatment for patients with clinical deterioration and severe relapsing C. difficile infection. The earlier the infusion is initiated, the less likely the patient's condition will deteriorate, thereby preventing the higher mortality rate associated with severely affected patients. Fecal Microbiota Transplantation is being increasingly used in clinical practice and, since complications of FMT are rare, its use is likely to increase.
A 2009 study found that fecal bacteriotherapy has the advantages of being an effective and simple procedure that is more cost-effective than continued antibiotic administration and reduces the incidence of antibiotic resistance.
As of May 2008, studies have also shown that FMT can have a positive effect on neurological diseases such as Parkinson's disease. While Dr. TJ Borody was experimenting with patients that were afflicted by both CDI and Parkinson's disease, he realized that after fecal therapy the symptoms of Parkinson's in his patients began to decrease; some to the point that the Parkinson's could not be detected by other neurologists. The hypothesis for future studies is that the fluctuation in the body's microbiome done by FMT can also be recreated by adding anti-Clostridium difficile antibodies to the patient's body and this technique shall be used in Dr. Borody's future case studies involving Parkinson's disease.
Read more about this topic: Fecal Bacteriotherapy
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