New methods for testing microbes in stool are proving to be more clinically useful than older culture methods alone. Acceptance of such improvements is historically slow and misconceptions and rumor abound. Three points (time-of-collection snapshot, anaerobe profiling, and quantitative accuracy) illustrate the superior performance of PCR versus culture for stool testing.
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Culture or DNA-Based Methods?
Culture of stool microbes certainly has its place, as I address below. But the moment a stool specimen is placed into growth media, things begin to change and inevitably cease to resemble the relative populations as were present at the time of collection. DNA-based methods fix this profile of microbes and present a vastly more accurate picture of colon bacteria in the patient.
We culture organisms from stool at Metametrix when we detect with polymerase chain reaction (PCR) and related techniques an over-abundance of a culturable species such as Klebsiella oxytoca or Staphylococcus aureus. Culture and sensitivity testing, for example, is helpful to determine which agents can arrest a particular bug that’s causing problems. And we’d not know much about certain bacteria/fungi if we had not found ways to grow and study them. Practically speaking, however, only aerobic or facultatively aerobic organisms can be grown in most clinical settings. Yet we know that 95% or so of colon bacteria are anaerobes.
Anaerobes dominate the colon. Our DNA-based methods allow us to have a close approximation (in comparison with published data using same and very similar techniques) of these predominant anaerobes. What we see are many people with low quantities! We would have no inkling of this information using culture methods alone.
The Hubble Telescope of Stool Tests
After more than 4 years of reviewing and discussing with clinicians the results of Metametrix GIfx Comprehensive Stool Profile, I am convinced that, with PCR and related methods, this test represents a quantum (well, giant) leap forward in our ability to help patients with chronic gastrointestinal problems. This segment tackles aspects of the microbial parameters…and reveals that most people need more (and varied) gut bacteria, plant-based diets and more robust enteric immune systems! This test offers an opportunity to have that fundamentally important conversation with patients/clients about eating and food and digestion and elimination! Only it’s easier to discuss now, because you can refer to a test report that is full of more useful data than ever before, data that is useful. Numbers that reflect what was actually happening in the patient’s colon when the sample was collected. This is news!
The GIfx stool test can promote heightened awareness of our diets, because it brings into the light of day the vital importance and power of natural whole foods and the appreciation of them as our ally in health. How we treat our bodies (much of which is reflected in sophisticated testing) is connected intimately with how the larger society treats the natural world. Think about how intimate an activity eating is! We take something INTO OUR MOUTHS. Something, at best, we savor and think will sustain and support our physiology — or, at worst, something we toss in that merely gives us calories to go on, caring not that it is made by mechanical energy and stripped of its vital essence and nourishment…and is often adulterated to boot.
To expect most people to consider properly feeding their universe of gut bacteria (their microbiome) often seems too much to ask! Yet, as I read research papers on the amazing roles these gut microbes play, among their populations and with their host, I am humbled by the fact that it is THESE guys, living in our most private of spaces, that have evolved to support US. Manufacturing B vitamins, mentoring the T regulatory cells of the immune system, aiding detoxification/elimination of waste. All of these are vital functions in our complex human body. It’s funny, you know. Sometimes, as in society at large, those most vital to our survival get the least respect.
And we act as if Homo sapiens is the only species on the planet. Hello!
~ Terry Pollock, MS
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