Prevotella

So women are misdiagnosed a lot because there's actually more bacteria at play than doctors usually test for.

So the ones that we think of are Gardnerella, Prevotella.

These are the ones that frequently show up in the vagina.

And so we give the same antibiotic over and over again, and if it doesn't work, we give it longer, right? But what we don't do typically is test to see what bacteria is there.

So two, three key things have to happen.

One is that you have to keep the pH low, 'cause toxic bacteria likes to be in high pH.

So if the pH is high, above five, six, seven, then you're gonna have toxic bacteria there, whether it's Prevotella or Gardnerella or strep or Enterococcus or whatever the bacteria is.

That's the environment they need.

And they sequenced the DNA in the swabs they took of the bacteria.

And people with the higher levels of, now write this down, Prevotella, P-R-E-V-O-T-E-L-L-A, histicola, H-I-S-T-I-C-O-L-A.

Prevotella histicola in their mouth showed faster reaction times on different cognitive tests, but the results for another microbe were mixed.

So I've given you the bacteria, and you can get this, and that can help prevent gum disease.

And it's important.

Biologically, it's about which bacteria invite themselves to the party first.

In a vaginal birth, the infant is covered in the mother's vaginal flora lactobacillus, Prevotella.

These are evolved to be the first colonizers.

In a C-section.

Psychobiotics, bacteria for your mind.

Essentially, these are probiotics specifically tested for their neurological effects.

For example, there was a study on a strain called lactobacillus plantarum PS128.

In mice, it significantly reduced anxiety behaviors.

And I think this, the fact that they're only looking at six bugs frequently, sometimes fewer, uh, never really more than 12, y- that they're really getting insufficient information about what's happening.

They're probably testing for Prevotella and Gardnerella and the, the ones that we anticipate to see, and that we classically will treat even without a test.

A woman will go in with vaginitis of some kind, and then the automatic prescription is metronidazole or clindamycin, right? Depending on how many times you've tried one or the other.

And then frequently [laughs] when it's not working, the answer is take it longer.

You can't actually keep good, healthy, thriving bacteria there.

And so that's true for two-thirds of women.

So if they have strep or they have enterococcus, or they just even have your run-of-the-mill Prevotella/Gardnerella mix, right? Then you take the antibiotic and you kill whatever's good and the bad for a period of time.

But classically, those women will then within three months get another infection.

If you have the wrong types of bacteria in your gut, um, that make short-chain fatty acids, um, if you don't have enough of these, you're gonna have an inflammatory response because of the gut-brain axis.

So what they found is, if you do, for example, you know, some of the GI testing, whether it's a CDSA, a comprehensive digestive stool analysis, or a GI map, if you find that your Prevotella/Firmicutes ratio, your Bacteroides, y- you've just got the wrong bacteria, and these wrong bacteria will drive inflammation.

So understanding that inflammation underlies all chronic disease.

So whether we're talking about long COVID, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, which by the way, it was interesting in this dive I did in the medical literature.

So we can actually see the Fusobacterium.

We can see the Prevotella intermedia.

We can see the campylobacter bacteria.

Like they are literally listed on the GI.

So I just say the sign and symptom is like biology screaming at us for us just to pay attention, just to notice we're busy and sometimes we're just not-- we notice, but we're not connecting the dots or putting that story together.

And so I say this child then who had cavities because of their airway then becomes that teenager or that college kid who comes back to me who now has gingivitis and now we wanna blame hormones and we could get into [laughs] the whole hormone topic, but now they're growing all these red complex, then they're having recession, then they're having bone loss, and then I tell them they have periodontal disease And you can just see this vicious cycle.

Then they're gonna grow Prevotella that you're asking about, and now they need a root canal, and I wanna know if they need a root canal.

Well, we can go in there, clean it out, but if they have all this Prevotella and in their bloodstream, it's like this vicious cycle.

Dr. Adams did the studies at ASU on that.

What, what he found in his study set were, it were the patients that were actually lacking Prevotella, that specific microbe, and the FMT replaced that.

And that is not something that you can get in probiotic form.

You can certainly try to encourage it through prebiotics, but sometimes it's, you know, difficult to do that.

It's other bacteria.

So there are many other pathogens that like to colonize the vagina besides Gardnerella or Prevotella.

And the only tools that these That GYNs usually have in their toolbox are, um, Metrogel and, um, fluconazole.

And, and so that may work for some of the pathogens, but it's not gonna work for the pathogens that are now colonizing a vagina because the pH of the vagina is too high.