By avoiding "intubation," microbiota bacteria in patients with lung infections can improve low oxygen levels

Newspaper headlines from the United States to the United Kingdom, as well as in most countries, highlight the surge
in patients infected with respiratory viruses.
The so-called "triad" of lung infections, including respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), influenza and COVID-19 (coronavirus), can last throughout the winter
.
The explosion of this infection requires more treatment options to support overstretched hospitals and overworked medical staff to restore people's health
.

It has long been known that intubating infants with any lung disease, even adults with severe COVID-19, using ventilation or extracorporeal membrane oxygenation (ECMO) carries risks and side effects that can lead to permanent damage
that is not limited to the lungs.
However, hypoxia, a medical emergency, is a common complication
of serious lung infections.
If left untreated, it can lead to severe disability and even death
.

Professor Claudio De Simone (MD, FAGA) is an internationally recognized European scholar
in the field of probiotics and human microflora.
His interest in the human gut microbiota dates back decades, when the importance of the role of the gut microbiota was just beginning to be understood
.
Professor De Simone is a member of the American Society of
Gastroenterology.
He is also a retired professor of infectious diseases at the University of L'Aquila (Italy), specializing in gastroenterology, allergy and clinical immunology
.
Since commercializing his iconic De Simone formula in the 90s, the professor has been active in campaigns for better regulation and quality control of probiotics based on potential risks to health and well-being
.
He has authored more than 200 published case studies, scientific articles, and book chapters
.

The following story is from the interview conversation:

The intestines absorb nearly one-third of the body's oxygen

Consider the fact that the human intestine receives almost one-third of cardiac output
.
What if we could save oxygen in the gut and redistribute it to other areas of the body to avoid intubation in certain vulnerable patient groups?

I decided to explore this issue
before the COVID-19 pandemic arrived.
As a retired professor of gastroenterology and immunology, I have focused most of my career on the gut microbiome
.
When the COVID-19 pandemic was announced, I immediately became involved in coronavirus-centered research
.

Currently, in general medicine, most of the knowledge about the microbiota is focused on the
large intestine.
In fact, early in my career, I developed and patented De Simone Formula Multi-Strains Probiotic, primarily for the dietary management of gastrointestinal conditions, including irritable bowel syndrome, ulcerative colitis, bunions, and chronic liver disease
.
Now, it's time to study uncharted territory and focus on the performance of the small intestine and its role
in the body's oxygen supply.

Everyone knows that our gastrointestinal tract processes nutrients to keep us alive
.
Most often, patients think that nutrients are vitamins and minerals, such as vitamin C or iron
.
However, it's important to remember that while you can't completely squeeze oxygen into a thirst-quenching mineral drink or a delicious energy snack bar, in fact, oxygen is also a nutrient
that the body needs to not only survive but thrive.

When a person is healthy and free of lung disease, oxygen spreads through the lungs to the capillaries and is transported to the cells by red blood cells (hemoglobin), balancing the increased levels
of carbon dioxide in the tissues due to cellular respiration.
Oxygen saturation levels indicate how much oxygen red blood cells in the body are assigned, and maintaining oxygen saturation levels of 95 to 100 percent is essential
for health.
Unfortunately, these values are reduced
in people with severe lung disease, including those with "triple" viral lung infections.
Oxygen levels below 90% require medical intervention
.

Use of microbial flora in the small intestine to improve hypoxemia

Initially, following my recommendations, the researchers found that reducing oxygen consumption in the gut by using the multi-strain probiotic formula SLAB51 could provide additional oxygen
to organs that are critical for an individual's survival, including the heart, brain, kidneys, and liver.
When these findings were clearly demonstrated through specialized research, I once again decided to propose the SLAB51 formula to provide the best option for doctors at the Infectious Diseases Clinic of the University of Sapienza in Rome, Italy to support their patients' recovery
.

They further studied existing SLAB51 studies and published recent studies demonstrating that harnessing bacteria in the small intestine could help improve hypoxemia
in COVID-19 patients.

The researchers were able to demonstrate that SLAB51 produced an additional boost in alleviating hypoxic conditions, thus allowing them to limit their use of continuous positive airway pressure (CPAP) machines to pump air into the lungs
during normal (non-mechanical) breathing.

Notably, according to a study completed in 2021, SLAB51 administration was associated with an 8-fold lower risk of developing respiratory failure leading to intubation and a 3-fold
lower risk of death.

How SLAB51 works

Nitric oxide (NO) is one of
the most effective signaling agents involved in the body's inflammatory process.
The probiotic formula SLAB51 contains arginine deiminase, and as a result, researchers report that it is able to regulate NO production
.

There is growing evidence that oxygen radicals such as NO and superoxide are key molecules
in the pathogenesis of infectious diseases.
In particular, increased levels of inducible nitric oxide synthase responsible for NO production were observed in the RSV-model, suggesting that RSV-associated NO production is involved in complex host responses and may mediate important aspects of clinical disease, as researchers at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center in Houston reported nearly 20 years ago
.

The researchers found that another particular effect associated with the uptake of SLAB51 is that it is able to produce an "oxygen-preserving effect" in the proximal intestinal part of the intestine by influencing the stability of hypoxia-inducible factors (HIFs), one of
the main cellular mechanisms that control intestinal oxygen consumption.

In conclusion, the management of SLAB51 provides a complementary approach to treating hypoxia observed not only during COVID-19 infection, but also during other respiratory viruses such as respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and influenza
.

Published Articles:

Giancarlo Ceccarelli et al, Oxygen Sparing Effect of Bacteriotherapy in COVID-19, Nutrients (2021).
 DOI: 10.
3390/nu13082898

Vito Trinchieri et al, Exploiting Bacteria for Improving Hypoxemia of COVID-19 Patients, Biomedicines (2022).
 DOI: 10.
3390/biomedicines10081851

Giancarlo Ceccarelli et al, Oral Bacteriotherapy in Patients With COVID-19: A Retrospective Cohort Study, Frontiers in Nutrition (2021).
 DOI: 10.
3389/fnut.
2020.
613928

James M.
Stark et al, Immune and Functional Role of Nitric Oxide in a Mouse Model of Respiratory Syncytial Virus Infection, The Journal of Infectious Diseases (2005).
 DOI: 10.
1086/427241