Skin Problems? Probiotics Can Help Improve Your Skin

A healthy outside starts from the inside. Understanding the connection between gut health and health of the rest of the body is nothing new, as Hippocrates stated, “all disease begins in the gut!” For many years in naturopathic medicine an unhealthy gut is believed to be the primary root of disease and assisting it in healing becomes a pathway to recovery of health and wellbeing. In conventional medicine this idea is generally not acknowledged, however more and more evidence is accumulating around the importance of gut health and we begin to understand that gut health is the key to good health.

Maintaining a healthy balance between good and bad bacteria in the body has many health benefits beyond the digestion; researchers have found that an unhealthy gut affects the health and appearance of your skin. If you are suffering from a skin condition and have tried treating the issue with traditional topical or oral medication and it either does not work or comes back once you stop the medication, there’s clearly a deeper source of your problem that might be due to an unhealthy gastrointestinal (GI) tract.

The GI tract and skin are both detoxifying organs. When the GI tract is inflamed it will have trouble absorbing all of the good nutrients our skin needs to look fabulous such as vitamins, mineral and antioxidants. Also, an unhealthy gut flora will make it more difficult to eliminate toxins and the accumulation of bad bacteria and toxins will clog up the lymphatic system, which then shows up through the skin as acne or eczema and other skin problems. So, if you are looking to clear up your skin, you have to start with your gut.  

Studies suggest consuming probiotics in foods or as dietary supplements may help to prevent or treat skin conditions. The benefit of probiotics is that they introduce healthy bacteria to the gut and help reduce inflammation. 

Probiotics help treat skin conditions 

As more research emerges, use of probiotics seems to be most effective in treating following skin conditions:

• Acne: Recent small studies conducted in Italy (Marchetti et al., 1987) and Russia (Volkova et al., 2001) found that probiotics from food or supplements used in conjunction with standard acne treatments help acne patients heal better and faster. Also, a study published 2010 in the journal of Nutrition found that acne patients who consumed a Lactobacillus-fermented beverage for 12 weeks experienced less acne.  In general, oral probiotics from several strains of Lactobacillus have been shown to have anti-inflammatory properties that display positive effects in improve skin health.

• Eczema: In an open trial (Enomoto et al., 2014) data suggests that prenatal and postnatal supplementation of bifidobacterium is effective in preventing allergic responses and decreases the risk of developing eczema during the first 18 months of life in infants.  Another study shows that supplementation of a mixture of bifidobacterium and lactobacillus acidophilus (Kim et al., 2010) is an effective in preventing the development of eczema in infants at high risk during the first year of life.

As our understanding of the human microbe grows, we deepen our appreciation of how complex and individualized each individual’s microbial environment is. A one-size-fits-all approach is very unlikely to achieve optimal results when it comes to altering microbiome, however, early studies suggest that oral probiotics hold potential in the treatment and improvement of skin health.   

Try our Lactobacillus and Bifidobacteria Probiotics

If you’re suffering from skin problems try taking our probiotics and see if your symptoms improve. You may notice improved digestion, clearer skin, and better immunity. Order a combination of different strains of lactobacillus and bifidobacteria. For more information call us today at (800) 219-8405.

References:

• Marchetti et al., 1987 “Efficacy of regulators of intestinal bacterial flora in the therapy of acne vulgaris” Clin Ter, 122 (1987), pp. 339–343
• Volkova et al., 2001 “Impact of impaired intestinal microflora on the course of acne vulgaris” Klin Med (Mosk) (2001), pp. 7939–7941
• Enomoto et al., 2014 “Effects of bifidobacterial supplementation to pregnant women and infants in the prevention of allergy development in infants and on fecal microbiota.” Allergol Int. Dec;63(4):575-85. doi: 10.2332/allergolint.13-OA-0683.  Epub 2014 Jul 25.
• Kim et al., 2010. “Effect of probiotic mix (Bifidobacterium bifidum, Bifidobacterium lactis, Lactobacillus acidophilus) in the primary prevention of eczema: a double-blind, randomized, placebo-controlled trial.” Pediatr Allergy Immunol. 2010 Mar;21(2 Pt 2):e386-93.