People who have been prescribed a course of antibiotics can take probiotics while following their treatment depending on their doctor's advice. For the best effects, it is important that the antibiotic and probiotic are taken as far apart from each other as possible.

Antibiotics and probiotics – a great example of yin and yang. Both help us live a healthy, vital life. Many people first hear of probiotics in relation to antibiotics.

Your doctor might have prescribed you an antibiotic and with that encouraged you to take a probiotic. When completing a course of antibiotics, taking a high quality probiotic is essential to your gut health and overall wellbeing.

What are antibiotics?

Antibiotics are an amazing medical invention and resource. Antibiotics destroy the bad bacteria that make us sick. The tricky thing with antibiotics is that they don’t distinguish between bad bacteria and the good bacteria that live in your gut and affect your health in multiple ways.

Our gut microbiome is made up of billions of good bacteria that assist in many vital processes in the body, including digesting food and absorbing nutrients, detoxification, aiding the immune system and even cognitive function. Unfortunately, by doing their job, antibiotics also destroy much of the good bacteria in our gut, which our body needs to properly function.

It has been scientifically studied that within the first 48 hours of antibiotic treatment, the good bacteria in your gut microbiome diminish significantly, leaving room for harmful bacteria to flourish. This can lead to symptoms including antibiotic-associated diarrhea, bloating, stomachache and nausea.

A study conducted by the Division of Gastroenterology-Hepatology at the University of Maastricht in The Netherlands, published in The American Journal of Gastroenterology, showed that the intake of a multispecies OMNi-BiOTiC® probiotic significantly reduced diarrhea-like bowel movements in healthy volunteers receiving amoxycillin compared to the control group.

Multiple rounds of antibiotic treatment in a short time period amplifies these effects and can even lead to a permanent reduction in the diversity of your gut microbiome. Science Daily shared a study in October 2018 that was conducted by the University of Copenhagen and the Steno Diabetes Center Copenhagen that shows that the composition and function of gut bacteria can recover after antibiotic treatment in healthy people.

In addition and more noteworthy in this context, the study found that after six months, the gut still lacked nine common beneficial bacterial species.

A rich and diverse gut microbiome is considered to promote health and help prevent chronic disease. Poor diversity of the gut microbiome is a characteristic feature of chronic disease, including obesity, diabetes, asthma and gut inflammatory disorders.

Restoring Your Body’s Microbiome

It is essential to take a high-quality probiotic supplement when completing antibiotic treatment in order to restore your gut microbiome with good bacteria and maintain its diversity. It is best to start taking a probiotic within the first 48 hours of starting your antibiotic treatment.

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