Tag Archives: nutrition

lassesen 6:00 am on February 11, 2024
Tags: , , nutrition, prebiotics,   

A follow up ME/CFS Analysis

This is a follow up on the prior post below. The reader’s comments are “I am feeling much better but still very fatigued and lately been quite achey.  The recommendations have changed significantly except for whole grain barley.”

For more analysis see: Analysis Posts on Long COVID and ME/CFS

Comparison of Microbiome Samples

Let us first do the simple numbers. A lot of values are the same (typical) but many of them show improvement. 🙂  indicate significant reduction is out of range values See Technical Note: Lab Quality Versus Bacteria Reported We would expect a 15% drop from lower lab quality, the drops shown are well below that).

CriteriaCurrent SampleOld Sample
Eubiosis Index62.8% 🙂59%
Lab Read Quality4.38.4
Outside Range from JasonH88
Outside Range from Medivere2020
Outside Range from Metagenomics1010
Outside Range from MyBioma88
Outside Range from Nirvana/CosmosId1818
Outside Range from XenoGene4242
Outside Lab Range (+/- 1.96SD)9 🙂16
Outside Box-Plot-Whiskers38 🙂98
Outside Kaltoft-Moldrup56 🙂139
Bacteria Reported By Lab494752
Bacteria Over 90%ile20 🙂82
Bacteria Under 10%ile66 🙂232
Shannon Diversity Index1.4651.701
Simpson Diversity Index0.0350.028
Chao1 Index747417093
Shannon Diversity Percentile28.561.4
Simpson Diversity Percentile30.221.5
Chao1 Percentile28.987.7
Lab: BiomeSight
Pathogens18 🙂39
Condition Est. Over 90%ile44
Kegg Compounds Low969 :-)1242
Kegg Compounds High5 🙂23
Kegg Enzymes Low272284
Kegg Enzymes High17 🙂75
P or P Chi2.9999245.999999999

Health Analysis Comparisons

I have not created an automatic compare yet (on to do list). Many values were similar, some interesting ones with improvements are below. Jason Hawrelak Criteria got worse, but I have deep reservations on using his criteria on Biomesight tests (he based them on a very different test method).

CurrentPrior
General Health Predictors: Flagged Bacteria8 🙂10
Anti inflammatory Bacteria Score14.4%ile 🙂13.3 %ile
Lactate (controls many bad bacteria) 33.1 %ile 🙂20 %ile
L-Lactic Acid (controls many bad bacteria) 47.1 %ile :-)25.2 %ile
NADH (Typically low with ME/CFS) 26.5 %ile :-)13.7 %ile
Hydrogen peroxide (controls many bad bacteria) 17.3 %ile 🙂5.8 %ile
D-Lactic Acid (Associated with brain fog) 6.5 %ile 🙂7.9 %ile
Potential Medical Conditions Detected2 🙂7
Bacteria deemed Unhealthy7 🙂22
Jason Hawrelak Criteria56.4 %ile75.8 %ile

Going Forward

A review of the Health Analysis was done above, with the two items: Mood Disorders and COVID-19 (a proxy for ME/CFS IMHO). A secondary review of all the items on [Changing Microbiome]/[US National Library of Medicine Studies] for high items not flagged. Nothing added.

Doing what is becoming a regular pattern: “Just give me suggestions” and then using given symptoms under Special Studies using these items:

Note: items like age and gender are omitted as well as any other symptoms that we do not have sufficient data.

First the filtered PDF suggestions. The list is much longer than usual:

And the to avoid list is more typical.

Let us go over to viewing the consensus for the latest microbiome sample to get some suggestions.


The highest suggested value/priority was 485 (so 240 for cutoff), lowest value was -574 ( so-287 for cutoff)

So in summary, shift a diet to low sugar, gluten free with moderation in meat (no guidance on chicken or fish). If your MD is willing, I would suggest reviewing Cecile Jadin approach with antibiotics and rotate with those suggested above. IMHO Continuous on a single antibiotic is more likely to complicate the microbiome.

Postscript – and Reminder

I am not a licensed medical professional and there are strict laws where I live about “appearing to practice medicine”.  I am safe when it is “academic models” and I keep to the language of science, especially statistics. I am not safe when the explanations have possible overtones of advising a patient instead of presenting data to be evaluated by a medical professional before implementing.

I cannot tell people what they should take or not take. I can inform people items that have better odds of improving their microbiome as a results on numeric calculations. I am a trained experienced statistician with appropriate degrees and professional memberships. All suggestions should be reviewed by your medical professional before starting.

The answers above describe my logic and thinking and is not intended to give advice to this person or any one. Always review with your knowledgeable medical professional.

lassesen 6:08 pm on January 31, 2024
Tags: food, , , mushrooms, nutrition   

Beta-Glucan and ME/CFS: The Microbiome Fixer

A reader that does microbiome analysis of her ME/CFS daughter ‘s microbiome using Microbiome Prescription expert system sent me this note with some literature.

Your wonderful system recommended beta-glucans [also written β-Glucan] for my daughter,  and when I looked further, I found this. I’m trying her on them for a month-, after testing her for reactions for three days- the first week has been hopeful. Will keep you posted if you wish.

Reader

β-Glucan is a nonstarch polysaccharide having documented health benefits and industrial applications. It can be extracted from various sources, including cereals, bacteria, molds, and fungi. The chemical nature of extracted β-glucan from these sources differs slightly. This variation in chemistry defines its industrial uses and health benefits.

Biopolymers for Food Design, 2018

Literature

There is not much literature available for ME/CFS.

  • “The findings showed that the beta-glucan supplementation significantly improved cognitive fatigue (assessed with FIS-40 scores) after the 36-week treatment compared to the baseline (p = 0.0338). Taken together, this study presents the novel finding that yeast-derived beta-glucan may alleviate cognitive fatigue symptoms in ME/CFS.” [2023]
  • β-Glucan Improves Conditions of Chronic Fatigue in Mice by Stimulation of Immunity [2020] Reduces TNF-α (which is connected to mast cell issues)
  • Effects of β-(1,3–1,6)-d-glucan on irritable bowel syndrome-related colonic hypersensitivity [2012]
    “β-Glucan did not affect the pain response in general but specifically affects the visceral pain response.”
  • Serum concentrations of 2′,5′-oligoadenylate synthetase, neopterin, and beta-glucan in patients with chronic fatigue syndrome and in patients with major depression. [1994]
  • “ the dosage of supplementation ranged from 2.5 to 1000 mg daily [of beta-glucan] for up to 6.5 months … The primary physiological outcome of the majority of the interventions was immunomodulation, which resulted in (a) strengthened immune defense that reduces the incidence and symptoms of cold, flu and other respiratory infections and (b) improvement of allergic symptoms.” [2021]
  • β-glucan attenuates cognitive impairment via the gut-brain axis in diet-induced obese mice [2020]

Some literature for Autism

Many Sources of Beta Glucan

Often the expert system on Microbiome Prescription comes up with Barley as a strong recommendation for ME/CFS people. Barley is an excellent source. Personally, I have oats or barley porridge a couple of times every week. The impact of the β-Glucan in the Barley may be the mechanism — we just do not have as many studies as we do for Barley.

  • “The primary sources of food β-glucan for humans are cereals (especially oats and barley), fungi, algae, and yeast ” [2023] A table from this article is below
  • “β-glucans bind to specific receptors on immune cells and initiate immune responses…. In vitro study found that the fermentation of barley and oat β-glucan by human fecal samples show variations in SCFAs production and the bacterial populations of Clostridium histolyticum and the ratio of Bacteroides–Prevotella species. Absorption of these SCFAs by the gut epithelial cells helps in regulating cell differentiation, proliferation, apoptosis, and gene expression (210). Butyrate increases the protein expression of tight junctions such as ZO-1 and claudin-1, resulting in enhanced intestinal barrier function.”
    “β-glucan is an essential food ingredient in controlling metabolic dysregulations linked to metabolic syndrome. β-glucans have a very minimal probability of having any unfavorable side effects and are reasonably inexpensive.” [2023]

Bottom Line

Real simple: Barley or Oats porridge for breakfast each day! Since there are some chemical differences between the β-glucans in these two grains– rotate between these (and different brands) at least monthly.

Using the generic suggestions for me/cfs we see both barley and B-glucan are positive (but oats are slightly negative). The more detailed citizen science suggestions are still be worked on, but I expect similar.

Reviewing Clinical Trials, my impression is 1 gram/day of β-glucans which translates to 20 grams of Barley or 40 grams of Oats per day.

“30g uncooked oats or barley will make a fairly small bowl of porridge whilst 70-80g will provide a particularly large serving for one person. Traditional porridge recipes tend to use oatmeal with approximately 200ml of water per 50g oats, and a pinch of salt.”

University of Aberdeen

Some people will advocate just eat mushroom. While correct that it contains beta-glucans, we need to be careful not to slip into homeopathic dosages!

Among those, mushrooms feature a particularly high level, so it’s no exaggeration when we say “for beta glucans, look to mushrooms!” The amounts of beta glucans found per 100 g of raw mushroom include 2.3 g (maitake), 2.0 g (bunapi), 1.9 g (eryngii), 1.8 g (bunashimeji) and 1.5 g (shimofuri hiratake) (Hokuto data).

https://www.hokto-kinoko.co.jp/lang/en/kouka/jiten/jiten06/

When we go to typical US mushrooms (i.e. Button), we drop to .75 g/100 grams [FDA]. So we are talking about 5-6 oz of mushrooms per day. That 3/4 of the typical mushroom package per day per person.

Celiac and Gluten Sensitive Issue

Most beta glucan supplements are produced from Saccharomyces cerevisiae (thus gluten free). For example the item below is about US$17.00 and gives 100 days at 1 gram per day.

I should note that there are different forms of beta glucan, for example above it is the 1,3/1,6 forms. Another product has 1,3/1,4 and is derived from Oats (you will have to write the company to see if it is gluten free or low gluten).

The cost per gram is much lower as bulk powders than with pre-filled “premium” capsules – the same volume of beta glucan can be as high as $250 (12x more) with some products.