As I continue doing an in depth review of AI selected PubMed articles, I came across a study showing that hyperbaric chambers may actually make antibiotics less efficient and encourage antibiotic resistance. This is of concern because using hyperbaric chambers is popular in some communities based on logic such as: “increased oxygen level will kill off bad bacteria”

The sensitivity of selected bacteria to a range of antibiotics was tested under hyperbaric conditions used in saturation diving. The effect of hyperbaric helium and oxygen (heliox) on antibiotic stability and on induction of beta-lactamase was also determined. Increased resistance to penicillin (up to 23%) was shown by Staphylococcus aureus and to gentamicin (up to 46%) and rifampicin (up to 18%) by Escherichia coli and Salmonella typhimurium at 36 and 71 bar pressure. Exposure to 71 bar heliox did not affect antibiotic activity but increased the production of beta-lactamase in inducible S. aureus and Bacillus subtilis and production of beta-galactosidase in inducible E. coli. Increased resistance to antibiotics in saturation diving conditions can be attributed in some cases to the influence of hyperbaric pressure on induction mechanisms in bacteria. The experimental system devised for this work is suitable for more detailed examination of the influence of hyperbaric stress on antibiotic resistance and of its effect on induction mechanisms in general.

The effect of antibiotics on bacteria under hyperbaric conditions. [1996]

“The gram-negative bacilli generally gave reduced zone diameters in oxyhelium,” [1984]  – reduced zone means less effective.

Studies

In reviewing some studies, we find that it produces symptom relief especially where hypoxia is a factor (CFS/ME, FM, IBD, etc). The ‘Dave Berg’ school of thought ascribes this hypoxia to hypercoagulation in the tissue, often localized.

• “Hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) provides 100% oxygen under pressure, which increases tissue oxygen levels, relieves hypoxia and alters inflammatory pathways. ” [2014]
• ” Recent evidence that hyperbaric oxygen inhibits the actions of certain cytokines, acts as an immune modulator and may help cognitive dysfunction has resulted in a re-examination of its potential role in rheumatic diseases. A case report of a lupus/scleroderma crossover patient is presented whose cognitive dysfunction improved after hyperbaric oxygen therapy.” [1995]
• “For example, under normal conditions age-related macular degeneration involves oxidative stress and death of the retinal pigment epithelial cells. Hyperbaric oxygen therapy may exacerbate these processes…. Delivery of hyperbaric oxygen therapy may need to be modified or it may even be contraindicated in these cases.  ” [2015]
• Hyperbaric oxygen treatment for Parkinson’s disease with severe depression and anxiety: A case report. [2018]
• Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy for Alzheimer’s Disease [2018].
• Adjunctive Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy promotes successful healing in patients with refractory Crohn’s disease.[2016]
• Hyperbaric oxygen therapy for digital ulcers due to Raynaud’s disease. [2018]

Bottom Line

Here we encounter a treatment that appears to have good short term effects (i.e. reducing hypoxia) with the possibility of encouraging the underlying condition by promoting resistance or altering the microbiome in an unfavorable direction.   A 1985 study raises questions about the impact of pressure on the cut microbiome which do appear to have been partially answered by a study this year:

• Gut fermentation seems to promote decompression sickness in humans [1985].
• ” Thus, the result suggest that hyperbaric pressure is an important exogenous factor that strongly modulated the intestinal morphology and microbial ecology, and induced several gastrointestinal ailments during hyperbarism. ” [2013]

We aimed to determine whether the composition of the fecal microbiota changes under hyperbaric conditions. In this study, we collected fecal samples from 6 healthy divers at three points during deep diving training (before, 2.1 MPa, end). The frequency of Clostridium cluster XVIII tended to be increased after compression. The frequencies of Clostridium cluster IV and subcluster XIVa were inversely correlated with that of Bacteroides. The compositional changes in the fecal microbiota exhibited interindividual variability. These findings suggest that hyperbaricconditions affect the fecal microbiota.

Effects of hyperbaric conditions on fecal microbiota. [2019]

Is it good or is it bad? It may depend on an individual circumstance.

Many people have a belief that their health issues were caused by Cell Phone towers, Microwaves, Wifi, overhead power lines, household current, etc. Producing evidence of this is hard because the percentage that are likely influence is very small and disappear into insignificance with most studies.

Approaching this issue orthogonally produces some interesting studies from pub med.

Biofilm bacteria are resistant to antimicrobics at levels 500 to 5,000 times higher than those needed to kill non-biofilm bacteria. In vitro experiments have shown that electric current can enhance the activity of some antimicrobial agents against certain bacteria in biofilms; this has been termed the ”bioelectric effect”.

Bioelectric effect and bacterial biofilms. A systematic review. [2008]

It is well documented that physiological electric fields provide the earliest signals necessary to initiate cell proliferation, migration, and ultimately reepithelialization of wounds. Additionally, electricity is known to exert an antimicrobial effect. An electric field-generating wound dressing designed to mimic physiological electric fields has not been described in the small animal clinic. This article retrospectively reviews the use of a microcell battery-impregnated bioelectric dressing (BED) in 5 small animal patients with complex wounds. 

Bioelectric Dressing Supports Complex Wound Healing in Small Animal Patients. [2018]

Presented herein is a novel bacterial biofilm combination treatment independent of traditional antibiotics, by using low electric fields in combination with small molecule inhibitors of bacterial quorum sensing – autoinducer-2 analogs…
End-point confocal microscopy measurements of biofilms treated with the autoinducer analog and electric fields in the microfluidic device show a 78 % decrease in average biofilm thickness in comparison to the negative controls and demonstrate good correlation with real-time optical density measurements. Additionally, the combination treatment showed 76 % better treatment efficacy compared to conventional antibiotic therapy.   

Autoinducer-2 analogs and electric fields – an antibiotic-free bacterial biofilm combination treatment. [2016]

The electric current significantly changed the colony-forming units (CFU) values (P<0.001). According to pair-wise comparisons, the highest CFU difference was observed between the AC group and the group without electric current (P<0.001); furthermore, the difference between the DC group and the group without electric current was not significant (P=0.823).

Effect of electric currents on antibacterial effect of chlorhexidine against Entrococcus faecalisbiofilm: An in vitro study. [2018]

Biofilm growth was monitored via impedance change at 100 Hz AC with a 50 mV signal amplitude. RESULTS: A 30% impedance decrease over 24 hours corresponded to Escherichia coli biofilm formation. The platform also enabled removal of the biofilm through the bioelectric effect; a low concentration of antibiotic combined with the applied AC voltage signal led to a synergistic reduction in biofilm resulting in a 12% increase in impedance.

Flexible Platform for In Situ Impedimetric Detection and Bioelectric Effect Treatment of Escherichia coli Biofilms. [2018]

All the three treatment modalities showed antibacterial effect. Application of current alone resulted in reduced bacterial growth than control group. Doxycycline alone resulted in reduction in bacterial counts better than control and current alone groups. The combination treatment showed greatest inhibition of bacterial colonies.

Application of bioelectric effect to reduce the antibiotic resistance of subgingival plaque biofilm: An in vitro study. [2018]

Bottom Line

We see recent studies have found that alternating current impacts bacteria and biofilms. In the above studies, the researchers looked at the antibiotic effect. The catch is, this means changing bacteria and cannot be restricted to bad bacteria ; good bacteria will also be impacted.

Believing that electromagnetic fields triggered a condition has some credibility. The World Health Organization has ongoing work on EMF.

Best solution (seriously): Use only DC power and live in a faraday cage. It is actually possible to do this, when we built our current house, we specified that an aluminum house wrap was to be used. No Wifi (cable only – today we would have specified fiber optic drops in all rooms).

I’ve written some AI software to scan candidate PubMed articles for my sit as well as future posts. The item below is a IMHO nicely constructed study with a key item identified. I’ve saw similar in other studies, but this was the cleanest.

RESULTS:

Among 1119 patients with UTI, 124 patients with diabetes were matched with 246 patients without diabetes. In patients with diabetes, the bacteria identified were: Escherichia coli (71%), Klebsiella (6%), Staphylococcus (5%), Enterococcus (4%), Proteus (2%) and Pseudomonas (1%); these findings were similar to those found in patients without diabetes. Resistances to ofloxacin and cefixim regardless of the bacteria were increased in patients with diabetes after matching on age, sex and history of UTI (respectively: OR=2.09; p=0.04 and OR=3.67; p=0.05). Regarding E. coli resistance, there was no difference whatever the antibiotic.

Bacterial resistance in urinary tract infections in patients with diabetes matched with patients without diabetes. [2016]

This may be the key to many autoimmune conditions — the bacteria sharing antibiotic resistance across multiple bacteria. This leads directly to the classic Rickettsia protocol (Cecile Jadin MD advocates for CFS/ME) of rotating antibiotic families over several months to overcome this challenge.

In re-reviewing pubmed articles, I came across this “The impact of meals on a probiotic during transit through a model of the human upper gastrointestinal tract.“[2011]

Enumeration during and after transit of the stomach and duodenal models showed that survival of all the bacteria in the product was best when given with a meal or 30 minutes before a meal (cooked oatmeal with milk). Probiotics given 30 minutes after the meal did not survive in high numbers. Survival in milk with 1% milk fat and oatmeal-milk gruel were significantly better than apple juice or spring water. S. boulardii was not affected by time of meal or the buffering capacity of the meal. The protein content of the meal was probably not as important for the survival of the bacteria as the fat content.

Bottom Line

Take probiotics before the meal, ideally with a little milk fat or oatmeal product.

A reader of my review on P3-OM probiotic, raised this one to be of concern due to the aggressive marketing on facebook with the prospect of fake testimonials being involved. Fake testimonials aka product reviews were something I know well from working at Amazon in the AI group detecting such. Unfortunately, I do not have access that the metadata on facebook to do such an evaluation. So it’s back to my pro-forma review of Elixa.

Contents

The following are listed without strains being specified  usually a big warning flag!

Lactobacillus Plantarum, Lactobacillus Rhamnosus, Lactobacillus Reuteri, Lactobacillus Acidophilus, Lactobacillus Casei, Lactobacillus Helveticus, Lactobacillus Salivarius, Bifidobacterium Bifidum, Bifidobacterium Lactis, Bifidobacterium Longum, Bifidobacterium Breve

https://www.elixa-probiotic.com/

This is even more concerning because of this claim on having “correct strains” but not naming them!

 Elixa supplies the correct species and strains of bacteria, in the correct quantities, to your large intestine 

https://www.elixa-probiotic.com/the-elixa-difference/

Question claims from their site

The “three days” is questionable, because I have seen any of these species be detectable after 24 hrs in any of the literature.

” Countless probiotic supplements contain bacteria and yeasts that are not adapted to reside in the human gut ” implies human sourced. Without the strains being identified this cannot be evaluated. I did a search of their site and there was no claim of any being human sourced — so this appears to be marketing spin.

Karl Seddon Founder and director:
” I graduated with a Masters in Engineering from Oxford University where I studied Biomedical Engineering and Process Engineering during my Masters year. ”

For the academic spin literate, this translates to: I did ONE course on how to manufacture products like probiotcs. Well, I did one course on psychology doing my Master’s — so I guess that I should start charging for psychological advice!

Email from Founder on Strains

I wrote to get information about strains. The full response is below for readers to evaluate themselves. I find some of his logic ‘interesting‘

1.  Regarding strain specification in the context of gut biofilms:
This is actually an obsolete method of describing bacteria. The genetic material within microbes changes rapidly inter- and intra-generationally (horizontal transfer). Biofilm communities in the gut render even the concept of species as an inaccurate way of describing microbial genetic information (which is what matters).

You may have heard of ‘strain’ designations such as GG (etc.) but these are essentially branding and not even the (obsolete) ATCC reference. They have no purpose other than an attempt at patenting/trademarking a naturally occurring object which has been in the public domain for quite a while…. since mammals first appeared (and earlier)…. about 200 million years, haha! 😉

Species, on the other hand, is a slightly broader umbrella and thus can be meaningful insofar as describing general phenotype etc.

If this is unclear, this article may elucidate:
http://coolinginflammation.
blogspot.co.uk/2010/04/
lateral-gene-transfer-in-gut-flora.html

Other scientists are beginning to realise this:
”Although the health benefits of probiotics have been considered to be strain-specific for decades, scientists are now recognizing commonalities among members of taxonomic groups, which may be at the root of some beneficial effects.

For instance, the International Scientific Association for Probiotics and Prebiotics’ consensus document on the scope and use of the term ‘probiotic’ pointed out that some effects and mechanisms that support them are broadly distributed among species within a genus (colonization resistance and short-chain fatty acids production etc.), others are frequent among different strains of the same species (vitamin synthesis, gut barrier reinforcement, etc.) and, finally, others appear to be less widely distributed among probiotic strains (neurological effects or immunological effects, etc.).

Mary Ellen Sanders and colleagues recently published a review of the implications of the fact that probiotic benefits may derive from shared mechanisms within taxonomic groups that go beyond strain-specificity.”

2. Regarding the seed strains used to culture our batches:
As for the SEED strains (which are ofc designated strains), these are proprietary. However, I can tell you that I’ve selected them with biogenic amine concerns in mind. I can also say that there are d-lactate producing species in Elixa, however, this has not produced any lactic acidosis symptoms in anyone yet (although I will be split-testing d-lactate vs none, prior to the upcoming Elixa V5 release).

3. Remember that an abundance of carbohydrate in the culture medium (or diet) will be preferentially fermented in place of amino acids (into histamine).

4. I do not personally view endogenous, microbial histamine production as problematic nor the cause of the various side-effects that can result from probiotic intake. (same for d-lactate, in most cases).

Thank you for your interest in Elixa!

Kind Regards,Karl Seddon
Founder & Director

Costs

In my review on P3-OM probiotic I compared things to one of the more expensive probiotics from customprobiotics.com and came to 100g at 400BCFU/gram for $190. That computes to $0.00475 per BCFU. This product is offering 6 packages of 500BCFU (equivalent to 1 gram for $40 or $0.017, roughly 3.5 times more expensive per cfu.

To actually do a better match: CustomProbiotics offers an 11 strain mixture. 100 gm at 260 BCFU for $190 or $0.0073 per cfu — 2.3x as expensive. Of course, custom probiotics provides strain identification.And at least some of these strain are actually researched with articles on PubMed.

Bottom Line

Similar to my comment on P3-OM probiotic , there is nothing technically wrong with this product. It is not the best bang for the euro. You are getting unknown strains (a major risk for those that are histamine sensitive) with out any published evidence on actual health benefits. This company has been selling for 15 years, I would expect some published articles by now.

I am also opposed to most probiotic mixtures because each bacteria has plus and minus features. So there is bias in me against all mixtures.

PubMed reports: “Your search for Elixa probiotic retrieved no results. “

I expect that it is very true that many people react to taking it — it is such a high dosage that it will likely cause chaos / diarrhea in some and after this, people will likely feel better (the same way people feel better after a cleanse). If you want the same effect, my competition reference: customprobiotics.com offers it cheaper!