Many of you may have heard of or used antibiotics and you’re wondering, what are postbiotics? Well, to put it simply, they are indeed bacteria-like substances that occur naturally in the body and serve a variety of roles. They can be produced by our bodies as natural regulatory systems that help maintain a range of important functions including controlling the population of certain beneficial (non-pathogenic) microorganisms, regulating the levels of nutrient concentration in the blood, regulating hormone levels, and serving as natural immunity against invading microorganisms.
Although they do occur naturally in the body, many people prefer to take antibiotics for long periods of time in order to achieve a higher degree of drug resistance. In recent years, however, there has been an emerging interest in the role that postbiotics play in human health and the management of antibiotic resistance. The purpose of this article is to educate the reader about the role that postbiotics play in antibiotic resistance and to provide a basic introduction into their role in the body.
Postbiotics foods – which also may be referred to as metabiotic substances, biogenetics, or simply probiotics – are both soluble and insoluble factors, released from the living organisms that live in the GI tract, providing both antibiotic effects and physiological benefits to the organism. The most common bacteria that are postbiotics include members of the Lactobacillus acidophilus species, the Order Gardnella and the Streptococcus species. When a person is taking antibiotics, whether to cure a disease or prevent another one, the organism that is being targeted by the antibiotic is subjected to a range of different stresses that may lead to an imbalance in how they release these important substances.
For example, when the body’s immune system is weak, it is more prone to getting infections and consequently more prone to developing infections. This is why a number of antibiotics can be effective against a particular bacteria and ineffective against another. As such, it is essential to ensure that you take a wide-range of antibiotics that do not affect each other and your body’s normal functioning. In this way, a person can ensure that when they take antibiotics, they are killing off the right bacteria at the same time as boosting the others, to achieve a balanced effect.