Merry Microbiome: Treatments for Autism
By Teresa Conrick
The Christmas season always warms my heart and gives me hope. I have a very ill daughter but her condition, called AUTISM, does not reflect the countless abnormalities in her body nor the pain and suffering that she has had to endure. Life for her though, is slowly but surely improving as we continue to focus on those abnormalities, especially the MICROBIOME. Megan and thousands like her, experienced profound regression in skills, communication and in health after vaccination. I thought it would be helpful and HOPEFUL to write about treatments being explored for autism and other conditions in which the microbiome is being implicated.
Food and the Microbiome
For all of the parents, researchers and doctors who have relentlessly pushed special diets and then saw improvements -- you were correct as the microbiome is involved:
A link between autism, gastrointestinal problems, and gut microbiota suggests that diet has the potential to impact symptoms, and parents of autistic children have long been exploring the impact of dietary and microbiota manipulations on behavior, for instance commonly using gluten-free and/or casein-free (GF/CF) diets, probiotics, and nutritional supplements. Two randomized controlled trials of the GF/CF diet indicated that it may improve symptoms in some children,37,38 although these trials were small, both in terms of size and duration. Although the GF/CF diet may improve symptoms by inducing changes in the microbiota and/or their metabolites, another mechanism is by increasing gut integrity. Abnormally high intestinal permeability (IPT), or a “leaky gut,” has also been associated with autism, suggesting that autistic individuals may have increased sensitivity to components of our diet and their metabolites, because they can more easily access the bloodstream.56 Autistic individuals on a GF/CF diet had significantly lower intestinal permeability compared with individuals on an unrestricted diet.56
Then there’s fermented foods, beneficial bacteria for the gut and brain:
Modern research is highlighting the potential value of ancestral dietary practices on mental health, and on resiliency against depression in particular. At the same time, there has been tremendous progress toward better understanding of the role played by the low-grade inflammation and the intestinal microbiome in human health and mental well-being [162,163]. Evidence would suggest that the two major themes of these mostly separate highways of research should converge; in other words, the fermented foods so often included in traditional dietary practices have the potential to influence brain health by virtue of the microbial action that has been applied to the food or beverage, and by the ways in which the fermented food or beverage directly influences our own microbiota. This could manifest, behaviorally, via magnified antioxidant and anti-inflammatory activity, reduction of intestinal permeability and the detrimental effects of LPS, improved glycemic control, positive influence on nutritional status (and therefore neurotransmission and neuropeptide production), direct production of GABA, and other bioactive chemicals, as well as a direct role in gut-to brain communication via a beneficial shift in the intestinal microbiota itself.
And let’s not forget the FIBER:
Still, some foods look promising. Dietary fiber serves as food for many of the bacteria that live in our guts, says microbiome researcher Jeff Leach of the Human Food Project. "It doesn't hurt as a general rule to eat more fiber," Leach tells The Salt.
Too little fiber could starve the bacteria we want around. "When we starve our bacteria they eat us," Leach says. "They eat the mucus lining – the mucin in our large intestine."
Knight adds that when we do keep our bacteria well fed, they, in turn, give off nutrients that nourish the cells that line our guts. Fiber, Knight says, "is thought to be good for your gut health over all.
There are a lot of different ways to get fiber. Leach recommends getting it from vegetables. Eat a variety of veggies, and eat the whole thing, he recommends. "If you're going to eat asparagus, eat the whole plant, not just the tips," he says.
Fiber was also central to Leach's suggestion to Stein to eat more garlic and leek. Those vegetables contain high levels of a type of fiber called inulin, which feeds actinobacteria in our guts. In fact, inulin is considered a prebiotic, since it feeds the good bacteria, or probiotics, that live inside us.
Garlic actually has antimicrobial properties, which paradoxically, could also be good thing for our microbiomes. One study shows that garlic hurts some of the bad bacteria in our guts while leaving the good guys intact.
Whole grains are another good source of fiber — but evaluating its benefits is a bit trickier. Whole grain consumption seems to be associated with high levels of a type of bacteria prevotella, Leach says. "Prevotella has been associated with inflammation in HIV patients [and] it's been associated with rheumatoid arthritis." We don't know why that is, Leach says. "So the jury's still out on whole grains."……..Fermented foods like kimchi, sauerkraut and yogurt might be surer sources of probiotics.
Which brings us to the importance of PROBIOTICS:
While harmful bacteria can ramp up anxiety, several studies have shown that beneficial bacteria can cause anxiety-prone mice to calm down. In a 2011 study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, for example, Bienenstock and colleagues fed one group of BALB/c mice broth laced with Lactobacillus rhamnosus, a microbe frequently touted for its probiotic qualities. Mice in a control group got just broth, with no microbial bonus. After 28 days, the researchers ran the mice through a battery of tests to detect signs of anxiety or depression.
Compared with mice in the control group, those fed Lactobacillus were more willing to enter exposed areas of a maze, and also less likely to give up and just start floating when subjected to a "forced-swim" test—a test that serves as a mouse analog of some aspects of human depression. The probiotic diet also blunted animals' physiological responses to the stress of the forced-swim test, causing them to produce lower levels of the stress hormone corticosterone. And in the mice fed Lactobacillus, some brain regions showed an increase in the number of receptors for gamma-aminobutyric acid, or GABA—a neurotransmitter that mutes neuronal activity, keeping anxiety in check.
Building a New Microbiome
The research is coming up solid on fecal transplants as a way to rebuild a microbiome:
The idea that bacteria teeming in the gut—collectively known as the microbiome—can affect not only the gut, but also the mind, "has just catapulted onto the scene,"….. Research has found, for example, that tweaking the balance between beneficial and disease-causing bacteria in an animal's gut can alter its brain chemistry and lead it to become either more bold or more anxious. The brain can also exert a powerful influence on gut bacteria; as many studies have shown, even mild stress can tip the microbial balance in the gut, making the host more vulnerable to infectious disease and triggering a cascade of molecular reactions that feed back to the central nervous system.
Such findings offer the tantalizing possibility of using beneficial, or probiotic, bacteria to treat mood and anxiety disorders—either by administering beneficial microbes themselves or by developing drugs that mimic their metabolic functions. The new research also hints at new ways of managing chronic gastrointestinal (GI) disorders that are commonly accompanied by anxiety and depression, and that also appear to involve abnormal gut microbiota.
Abnormal gut microbiota is a devastating reality in autism. From my findings in the research, both vaccines and mercury can negatively affect the microbiome, and we see the bacteria population in autism follows that pattern:
High proportions of autistic children suffer from gastrointestinal (GI) disorders, implying a link between autism and abnormalities in gut microbial functions. Increasing evidence from recent high-throughput sequencing analyses indicates that disturbances in composition and diversity of gut microbiome are associated with various disease conditions. However, microbiome-level studies on autism are limited and mostly focused on pathogenic bacteria. Therefore, here we aimed to define systemic changes in gut microbiome associated with autism and autism-related GI problems…… we compared gut microbiomes of GI symptom-free neurotypical children with those of autistic children mostly presenting GI symptoms. Unexpectedly, the presence of autistic symptoms, rather than the severity of GI symptoms, was associated with less diverse gut microbiomes. Further, rigorous statistical tests with multiple testing corrections showed significantly lower abundances of the genera Prevotella, Coprococcus, and unclassified Veillonellaceae in autistic samples. These are intriguingly versatile carbohydrate-degrading and/or fermenting bacteria, suggesting a potential influence of unusual diet patterns observed in autistic children. However, multivariate analyses showed that autism-related changes in both overall diversity and individual genus abundances were correlated with the presence of autistic symptoms but not with their diet patterns. Taken together, autism and accompanying GI symptoms were characterized by distinct and less diverse gut microbial compositions with lower levels of Prevotella, Coprococcus, and unclassified Veillonellaceae.
This example is very promising regarding changing the microbiome:
In a follow-up experiment, Bercik's team corralled two strains of mice born and raised in a sterile environment: timid BALB/c mice, and NIH Swiss mice, known for their courageous, exploratory behavior. The researchers then colonized each group of these "germ-free" mice with bacteria from mice of the opposite strain. The result of this microbial swap was uncanny: The normally anxiety-prone BALB/c mice became much more fearless explorers, while the typically daring NIH Swiss mice suddenly grew more hesitant and shy. The results, Bercik says, underscore that at least in laboratory mice, some seemingly intrinsic characteristics are driven not solely by the animals themselves, but also by microbes inhabiting the gut. Whether the pattern holds up in humans, whose guts harbor more diverse microbial communities, remains to be seen, Bercik says.
It doesn't necessarily take a full-scale microbial transplant to trigger behavioral change. The addition of a single bacterial strain can also change mouse behavior. In one of the earliest studies showing that adding a single bacterium can influence behavior, microbiologist Mark Lyte, PhD, of Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center, and colleagues stirred a small dose of the pathogenic bacterium Campylobacter jejuni—too little to trigger an immune response—into saline solution and fed it to a group of lab mice. The results, published in Physiology and Behavior in 1998, showed that two days later, mice that consumed the bacteria were more cautious about entering exposed areas of a laboratory maze—a common measure of anxiety in rodents—compared with mice in a control group.
Will These Researchers and Treatments Also Target the Microbiome in Autism?
With lightning speed, research is now showing that the microbiome is the flame to the fuse of many diseases:
Inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis
As a result, researchers, universities and companies are scattering to discover novel treatments. Here are a few examples, some for autism and some not yet, but I do think that they may be very pertinent:
• “Study: Frozen poop pills may make fecal transplants simpler and safer”
Would you swallow frozen poop in a pill? What if you were infected by a stubborn strain of Clostridium difficile and suffering from diarrhea bad enough to send you to a hospital?...... The idea is that a healthy person’s poop contains the right mix of gut bacteria to keep the gastrointestinal tract running smoothly. By transplanting a sample from that microbiome into a person whose gut has been colonized by C. difficile, the recipient can get his or her GI tract back in working order…. Overall, the researchers reported, the frozen poop pills led to “clinical resolution of diarrhea” in 90% of the patients.
What makes this treatment potentially appropriate for autism is that Clostridia infections are also another pathogenic piece of the autism microbiome puzzle .
• “Helminth Colonization Is Associated with Increased Diversity of the Gut Microbiota”
Since we know from research that autism has LESS diversity in bacteria, Helminth therapy is being considered and studied .
• “RePOOPulating’ the gut”
This pilot study shows that a synthetic stool (stool substitute) may be an effective and feasible alternative to the use of defecated donor fecal matter (stool transplant) in the treatment of recurrent CDI….the clinical cure achieved at 6 months of follow-up demonstrates feasibility of this approach as an alternative to conventional stool transplant.
• “Minding the microbiome: how a commensal gut bacterium treats autism-related symptoms in mice”
… scientists are finding that the microbes that make up "us" play an important role in a variety of biological processes. Not least of these is brain development and function; recent studies show that microbes have the remarkable ability to impact neural activity and complex behaviors. Based on such microbe-brain interactions, we asked whether changing the composition of our gut microbiome could influence neural health and disease in a mouse model for autism, a devastating neurodevelopmental disorder that afflicts 1 in 88 children in the U.S. I will present collaborative work between the Patterson, Mazmanian and Reisman labs at Caltech on a potential microbe-based therapeutic for the treatment of autism-related gastrointestinal and neurobehavioral symptoms.
• Not yet discussed for autism, a Cambridge company is developing a pill to target clostridium infections
Cambridge-based Seres Health, a contender in the haute field of microbiome therapeutics, just hauled in a $48 million Series C round. The startup’s developing biologics that target recurrent C difficile infections ....The patients received oral doses of Seres’ microbiome “spores” – that is, precursors to “good” gut bacteria that mature into disease-fighting agents. They’ve been isolated from human fecal matter, then delivered in pill-form to the patient.
• Autism Speaks is putting money to a worthwhile study- “Autism Speaks Awards $2.3 Million in Research Grants”
Grant recipients include Dr. James Versalovic of the Baylor College of Medicine in Waco, Texas, who will lead an in-depth analysis of the microbiome — the gut's complex community of digestive bacteria — with a focus on changes that relate to autism symptoms and gastrointestinal problems.
• Though antibiotics can be villainized often, they seem to have a role in mending the microbiome: “Improvements in Behavioral Symptoms following Antibiotic Therapy in a 14-Year-Old Male with Autism”:
This case report describes the benefits of antibiotic and antifungal therapy on behavior in a child with autism undergoing treatment for encopresis. Over the course of treatment, the child exhibited a reduction in aberrant behaviors, increased gastrointestinal function, and improved quality of life.
• Existing therapies targeting the gut microbiome include diet, antibiotics, and probiotics. Dietary restriction, including the removal of dairy casein-containing products, wheat and gluten sources, sugar, chocolate, preservatives, and food coloring have all been found to be therapeutic in autism….. . Gastrointestinal problems in autism appear to respond to antimicrobial agents. Treatments targeting Candida, and probiotics have been used to reduce disbiosis and control gut permeability (Kidd, 2002). Other strategies include the removal of heavy metals (including mercury) by chelation and sulfur-sulphydryl repletion::
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As we end 2014, it may be important to keep these ideas in mind as they are hopeful for many:
Unlike the genome, which is relatively fixed, a person's microbiome is changeable over a lifetime — and perhaps even daily.
Today autism is treated primarily through behavioral therapy. But the new study suggests that treatment may one day come in the form of a probiotic…..
"As a clinician, you may think of this as sort of voodoo science. 'What are you doing? Putting stool in patients? Come on, that is almost like bloodletting!'" Kao says. "But as someone who appreciates the importance of gut microbiota in health and disease, I see this as a tremendous step forward for medicine."…… The success for fecal transplantation for recurrent C. difficile has prompted initial efforts to determine if it may be useful in other conditions, including those beyond the intestine. There are reports of small numbers of patients who have had improvement following fecal transplant for conditions as varied as multiple sclerosis, diabetes and autism.
We are entering a new era in autism. No longer can it be said that autism is a mystery with no known cause or treatments.
Teresa Conrick is Contributing Editor to Age of Autism.
For more information on propionic acid/short chain fatty acids, nutrition, metabolism and microbiome, see the work of Dr. MacFabe and the Kilee Patchell-Evans Autism Research Group on our website (free open access- webinars, peer reviewed publications, documentaries) at http://kpearg.com/
Posted by: Derrick MacFabe | November 30, 2019 at 04:25 PM
It appears that my problem other that gluten is - histamines. I can not tolerate fermented foods - or at least a lot of them.
I cannot eat apple cider vinegar - much of it.
I cannot eat a lot of fermented food and not get sick
And here we are - Histamine foods.
One web site had this to say?
Histamine intolerance may be caused by abnormally low levels of DAO. DAO is found, among other places, in the membranes of cells lining the small intestine and the upper portion of the colon, therefore people with damaged gastrointestinal systems seem to be at higher risk for histamine intolerance.
Posted by: Benedetta | April 01, 2015 at 11:56 PM
Mildly off-topic but related:
Breaking News: Study Finds Major Yogurt Companies Misleading Consumers
http://www.foodwifery.com/breaking-news-study-finds-major-yogurt-companies-misleading-consumers/
The link has a short video discussing a detailed report from the Cornucopia Institute regarding how Yoplait, Dannon, and the other big names have turned yogurt into just another junk food. Unlike the makers of Twinkies and HoHos however, they market their junk food product as being good for you.
Here's the full report from Cornucopia explaining their methodology and results. They also let you know who the good guys are.
http://www.cornucopia.org/yogurt/
Cornucopia's blog is also a daily must read.
Posted by: Jeff C | December 24, 2014 at 10:09 AM
Regarding store bought items, here's what we use, some of this is redundant with what I wrote below but I'll put it all in one place. These might be regional brands but we get them at Whole Foods in California:
- Redwood Hill Farm goat milk plain yogurt
- Redwood Hill Farm goat milk plain kefir
(My otherwise GFCF son has no problem with this. They do add some tapioca starch as a thickener but other than that nothing else. Astronomically high probiotic counts according to the test results on their website.)
- Strauss Family Creamery Organic Whole Milk Plain Greek Yogurt (This stuff is amazing, almost like tangy ice cream. Only ingredients are whole milk and the cultures. Probably not safe for the casein sensitive)
- Farmhouse Culture Raw Organic Krauts (half a dozen different flavors, I like caraway, my son likes garlic dill. Note that it's raw. Much store-bought sauerkraut isn't raw but is heated after fermentation to increase shelf life. Make sure it says raw or unpasteurized to get the live cultures.)
-Inner-eco Fresh Coconut Probiotic Water (You can spike a vegetable or fruit smoothie with this stuff. We use it as a starter culture to make our own GFCF coconut milk yogurt. It's easy, here's a link to the instructions.)
http://nomnompaleo.com/post/45263391503/paleo-plans-simple-coconut-milk-yogurt
Posted by: Jeff C | December 24, 2014 at 08:58 AM
Article is so brief but it is necessary for the people having children or the family members with autistic disabilities.
But as the article is about the gut microbiome, so I think I want to mention here and that think is some diets like GF/ Cf diets are advised to be taken by the autistic individuals to avoid intestinal inflammation, http://www.articlesbase.com/nutrition-articles/restricted-diet-may-reduce-the-severity-of-autism-7086853.html
Posted by: Tamara Watson | December 24, 2014 at 01:02 AM
Hi All and Happy Holidays!
Sorry I am coming on so late but hectic day and a lot of running around. The comments are great- thanks!
Jeff, a big thank you for adding on what is helping your family. It's very interesting and as you can tell, I'm a big believer! I will have to read, “In Defense of Food” as I am not familiar with it. I am very hopeful 2015 will bring us more treatments and options.
Anyone buying fermented foods out there to save time? Good brands?
thanks!
Posted by: Teresa Conrick | December 24, 2014 at 12:06 AM
Thank you, Jeff C & Benedetta, for the suggestions! I think I have some extra time to try something completely new and see how it goes.
Benedetta, I don't know why, but I have issues with apples too these past few years. My daughter also. I used to eat two or three or four a day as a kid. Everything seems upside down now and backwards sometimes too.
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | December 23, 2014 at 10:06 PM
Hi Teresa - I've been going through your links and many of them are new to me even though I follow this subject pretty closely. Great job and thanks for pulling this all together in one place. It's a tremendous resource.
Jeff
Posted by: Jeff C | December 23, 2014 at 09:20 PM
Jeannette Bishop
Getting the to eat it, and eat it at least every day, let alone every a couple of meals is frustrating.
However; if they eat it with other food - it does make other food taste better.
Dill pickle with meatloaf, or lacto fermented sweet potatoes in tuna, or chicken salad.
I have been playing around a lot with all this lacto fermented stuff. for about five or six years. I hit it this summmer - that I filled up my second refrig down in the basement. Geesh!
Anyway:
I like only 1 Tablespoon of salt per quart of water; that is enough -- two and three Tablespoons are way too much.
Cover the top with extra cabbage leaves, or grape vine leavs or oak leaves. And I put sometimes a small glass candle holder on top to hold it all under the salt weter.
You will find lots of recipes and here is a fewt things I found out.
--
I like sauerkraut with red, or green or both kinds of cabbage, onion, garlic and one cayenne pepper. I like the carrots only if they are cut up very fine.
I do not like apples in my sauerkraut. As a matter of fact there is something going on with me and the microbes that grows on apples, I am beginning to believe. Everyone recommends Apple Cider Vinegar - the mother. How ever: I am pretty sure it made me sick last late winter. It turned on my hormones just like when I eat a piece of gluten bread. Frontal Head ache, body aches - actually monthly activity for the first in five or six years.
And oregano; I made one recipe of sauerkraut that called for three Tablespoons of oregano. That is suppose to be great for fighting off fungus?? At first it was really strong but then it mellowed out. However; when I ate it cramped my stomach so bad I had to go to bed and curl up into a ball. And I could taste it all night long, so no more of oregano for me!
Other lacto fermented food that I found I liked was:
Lacto fermented green beans with garlic, onions, and a cayenne pepper, and lots of dill.
I like cauliflower with garlic, onions, cayenne and with or without dill - As a matter of fact this is my favorite. You can't go wrong on this - if I was a beginner this would be the first thing I would try..
I like raw sweet potatoes cut up julienne with ginger, garlic, onion, - excellent - I cannot tell them from lacto fermented carrots. We are eating a jar of them now.
Dill pickles - be careful -- these unlike the sweet potatoes, carrots, green beans, cabbage and cauliflower which takes weeks - cucumbers only takes about a week and then they want to go soggy/mushy. But they are my son's favorite. Again lots of garlic, onkion, cayenne and dill.
Hmmmm love sweet peppers too. The do however go very sogg and mushy. But it does not matter, for I like to cook with them. Sweet pepper adds something to the dish that was not there before - taste wise. You can put them almost anything soups, chilis, hamburger, meatloaf.
Jalapeno peppers are different from sweet peppers - they do not go mushy - after they set out and ferment and you put them in the refrig -- they only get better and better as time goes on.
Water must not be chlorinated, but you don't have to run to the store, just let the water sit for an hour to three hours - and the chorine evaporates out -- esp, by the time it comes pouring out of the faucet.
I had a great time with it.
However Kroger sells this stuff; in the refrigerated section.
Posted by: Benedetta | December 23, 2014 at 06:50 PM
Regarding a sauerkraut recipe, We have not made it ourselves but a friend swears by Diane Sanfilippo's recipe:
http://balancedbites.com/2012/01/easy-recipe-raw-sauerkraut-fermented-probiotic-food.html
Posted by: Jeff C | December 23, 2014 at 04:43 PM
Oh, and hook worm is a very limited species. They cannot make it through to the next part of their life cycle in the areas that have a a cold season, that is below freezing temperatures. To get to the next host they have to make it back into the soil to wait for the barefooted.
These diets though;
The Cravings --
It is heart wrenching to meet a 400 pound man out in the waiting room of a doctor's office that has diabeties, and one kidney taken out because of cancer - and he tell me he can't he just can't.
Which gets us to the craving for alcohol -- AA and drugs.
Which gets me to my waxing and waning anemia and my desire for crushed ice. I knew it was ruinin my teeth but my cravings was over came that fear. When all it took was an iron tablets and that craving went away.
There is so much we just don't know.
Posted by: Benedetta | December 23, 2014 at 01:56 PM
Thanks again, Teresa! So many important points to look into.
Anyone have a sauerkraut recipe they would recommend? I don't have a Whole Foods nearby, but I have some organic cabbage right now in my fridge.
Posted by: Jeannette Bishop | December 23, 2014 at 01:44 PM
CIA Parker.
Hook worms would be the last one that should be selected -- surely??? Hook worms is a new parasite on the evolutionary scale, and newly evolved parasites are dangerous.
Helminthes is not really a taxonomy name -- it just refers to any parasitic - anything; not always just worms --such a name does not even exist in scientific terms. An example helminthes has been referred to in a ring worm skin infection and it is in fact not a worm but a fungus.
There is no real agreement on the taxonomy of the helminthes, particularly with the nematodes. Nematodes would be worm like, and that would be what we would be referring to when we think helminthes.
The Nematodes are four groups with superficial similarities and they are: the phyla Annelida (Only one example of many - earthworm), Platyhelminths (only one example of many- tape worm), Nematoda (only one example of many - pinworm) and Acanthocephala (only one example of any - hookworm)
And even these are not very well classified - mostly put into these groups because they are flat, or round or segmented. Not a very good way to classify really.
But know this; like bacteria, like mammals, like reptiles - there is many species of Nematodes.
And how they get inside us is amazing. Walking across the lawn in our bare feet - so that is why it was great that we bury our bathroom stuff, and be careful of walking barefoot where a lot of dogs go poop.
My kids have never walked barefoot in their lives out in the grass because I knew this - and it is a habit - they won't do it now-- and just look how unhealthy they are.
I on the other hand never put on shoes in the summer, and went to the woods everyday to play.
It would be great to know what species we need and what we don't need and how to keep those we have under control. We know a lot - but apparently not enough.
Posted by: Benedetta | December 23, 2014 at 01:31 PM
Cia,
We aren't using hookworms or whipworms -- we are using HDCs which don't colonize in humans, or leave the lumen of the gut. If we don't replenish them they just die off and leave his system. I think of it as similar to probiotics-- replacing what's diminished in his gut. Also they are much more affordable then other options. We also do many of the same things that Jeff C. does in addition to the helminth therapy....clean, real foods, fermented foods, probiotics etc. It takes a lot of work to undo what has been done to my son's health and well-being.
Posted by: CD | December 23, 2014 at 12:25 PM
CD,
Isn't Helminth therapy putting in hookworms? Is there a down side to putting parasites into your body deliberately?
I hope they come up with good therapies to reverse autism. I tried the homeopathic hep-B vaccine and DTaP vaccine for my daughter, but they didn't have any effect. Maybe because they weren't made from the exact vaccines that she got. I had read about kids recovering on the special diets. The diets successfully treated her GI condition, which was horrible and caused a lot of suffering, but didn't change the symptoms of her autism at all. We tried all the supplements in Dr. Sears' The Autism Book (from the list in the middle of the book, not every one mentioned), every day for three years, but none of them seemed to make any difference.
I have a feeling that her autism, springing from encephalitic reactions to at least two vaccines, did physical brain damage to the neural circuits responsible for speech and social relationships, and I also have a feeling that improving her microbiome hasn't and isn't going to have any effect on her symptoms.
Posted by: cia parker | December 23, 2014 at 11:30 AM
Great article Teresa. Sorry for the length of this comment, but I wanted to pass along our experience in this regard. The improvements with our son and the rest of our family’s health over the last year have convinced me that not only is the microbiome the key to autism, but it also plays a huge role in all “diseases of civilization”. The combined effects of manufactured food, broad spectrum antibiotics, vaccines, and chlorinated water have likely altered our microbiomes in ways unlike anything seen in human history. We are conducting a vast real-time experiment and the results aren’t pretty.
Here’s a long but extremely comprehensive article from the wonderful Dr. Derrick MacFabe at the University of Western Ontario “Autism: Metabolism, Mitochondria, and the Microbiome”. I believe Dr. MacFabe has put most of the pieces together. In short, an altered microbiome produces excessive level of short chain fatty acids, primarily propionic acid. These high levels of SCFA poison the cells leading to mitochondria dysfunction and ultimately autism. His team’s mouse model has an additional fascinating aspect in that high SCFA levels produce different effects depending upon sex. Male mice exposed to propionic acid tend to act autistic, female mice less so but exhibit behaviors reminiscent of eating disorders.
http://www.psychology.uwo.ca/pdfs/autism/GAHMJ-Nov2013-MacFabe.pdf
We have been on a year-long quest to rebuild our family’s microbiome. With the exception of fecal transplants, we’re doing everything on your list. As I mentioned in comments on other threads, my son is doing great with big improvements in spontaneous, situation-appropriate speech and improved muscle coordination. All his teachers have commented on it. The rest of the family has also benefited. I’ve reversed early signs of metabolic syndrome and my wife has lost 35 pounds. Here’s what we’ve done.
We eat real food. Michael Pollan’s “In Defense of Food” is a good read and a great place to start. By “real food” I mean plants and animals. To most Americans, their “food” consists of a manufactured concoction made from processed wheat, corn, and soybean seeds, cooked in oil extracted from the same seeds using industrial processes (aka “vegetable” oil). This mess is then further spiked with huge amounts of sugar, HFCS, and chemical additives. Aside from produce, meat, fish, and dairy, most supermarket food would be unrecognizable to our ancestors (and their microbiome). We stick to the supermarket perimeter, stay out of the aisles, and eat organic whenever possible. (Think of what pesticide and herbicide residues do to the microbiome, potentially along with the damage from GMO for that matter.) Don’t eat anything your great grandparents wouldn’t recognize. When you eat like this, fiber (from produce rather than grains) is plentiful.
We eat fermented foods. Our ancestors didn’t have refrigeration, so they used fermentation to preserve food; this surely had a dramatic effect on their microbiome. We make homemade coconut milk yogurt and eat it every day. We also eat store bought fermented foods, but only those that are organic and made in small batches. Yoplait yogurt is not real food, but mass produced candy masquerading as something healthy. There are many small creameries that make tasty plain yogurt. Although he’s GFCF, we’ve found our son tolerates goat milk yogurt, likely due to the fact that goat milk casein’s amino acid structure is different from that of cows. (Goat milk is more similar to human milk.) Redwood Hill Farms makes great plain goat’s milk yogurt and kefir that our son eats every day. The rest of the family likes it too, but we also eat plain organic cow’s milk yogurt. We eat sauerkraut almost every day, but make sure it’s of the raw organic variety and not some mass-produced imposter. Farmhouse Culture is our brand of choice. All of these are available at Whole Foods, at least on the West Coast.
We take probiotics. We’ve tried a bunch of them, most with disappointing results. Dr. Mercola’s probiotics have given us good results but I can’t tell why it seems to be more effective than others.
We drink water while making sure it’s filtered to remove chlorine and pesticide residues. Unfortunately filtering also removes minerals so we supplement those. No sodas (regular or diet), no fruit juice, no sugar-laden sport drinks, no kool-aid, just water (and coffee for the adults). We’ll add a few drops of Stevia flavoring to the kid’s water as a treat, but that’s it. They complained bitterly at first, but eventually got used to it.
We don’t take antibiotics (except in extreme situations) or vaccines anymore. Of course we stopped the vaccines long ago after my son regressed, but in hindsight I think they were the “final straw” of a much larger developing scenario rather than the sole cause. I developed an ear infection and had to take a ten day course of Ceftin and it wreaked havoc on my digestive tract that took months to recover. Watchful waiting is our new norm.
The results have changed our lives and not just for my son. My wife and I have seen dramatic health improvements. People routinely comment on how our skin seems to glow and how our complexions have completely changed. I sleep soundly at night, usually going for seven to eight hour stretches without waking a single time. (This after two decades of frequent insomnia.) Our digestion has improved dramatically, we are all regular. This includes my son, who has had constipation issues virtually his entire life. This microbiome stuff is real.
I’m anxiously looking forward to low-cost fecal transplant treatments. I genuinely believe it will put large segments of the medical industry out of business and thus will be fought vociferously by the vested interests. It really is up to us to spread the word.
Posted by: Jeff C | December 23, 2014 at 11:23 AM
When I put my daughter on the GFCF diet nearly three years ago, I worried about taking all the fiber she had been eating out of her diet, and thought it would make the severe, chronic constipation even worse. But the opposite happened. Even without the high-fiber breakfast cereal and whole wheat everything, the constipation entirely stopped within two days of taking away the cereal and the whole wheat. Two years ago she had gotten worse when I was giving her DMSA for chelation (it increases sulfur, which exacerbates the problem), and I put her on a grain-free diet, no grains of any kind, just meat, starch-free veggies and fruit, and almond flour everything. And again, it immediately solved the problem, within two days of starting the diet. The idea is that the yeast and bacteria in the intestines feed on the grain products, not just the gluten and casein, and if you deprive them of food, they die.
I'm sure there are many different variants of these problems, but for my daughter, taking away grain and all the fiber it contained completely solved her problem, counter-intuitive as it has always seemed to me.
Posted by: cia parker | December 23, 2014 at 10:47 AM
We have started using Helminth therapy, recommended by our son's physician, for treatment of his autoimmune disorder. He also happens to be on the spectrum. I have been following the research for years and was excited to try this intervention. It's made a big difference. Just a few months into treatment and all of his autoimmune blood markers have normalized, his symptoms have abated and he seems happier. He's also so much more social and connected with people. It was enough of a change to draw the attention of his school, who called me to report the amazing progress he has made. I wish mainstream medicine would pay more attention to the science related to the microbiome. Thank you for continuing to write about this Teresa.
Posted by: CD | December 23, 2014 at 08:15 AM