Supplements containing the company’s ibSium branded probiotic were associated with a 34% reduction in pain for people with IBS-C, compared to baseline levels, according to findings published in the United European Gastroenterology Journal.
“Our results provide additional data to those obtained before on the beneficial effect of S. cerevisiae I-3856 in IBS,” wrote the authors from the Nottingham Digestive Diseases Centre (UK), Lesaffre Human Care (France), and Biofortis–Mérieux NutriSciences (France).
“Although there was no effect of S. cerevisiae supplementation on IBS symptoms and quality of life in the total population, S. cerevisiae I-3856 improved gastrointestinal symptoms in the subgroup with constipation.”
“The best substantiated natural ingredient for IBS symptoms”
Commenting on the results, Peter Jüsten, managing director of Lesaffre Human Care, said: “With this new official publication, ibSium becomes the best substantiated natural ingredient with a clinically proven effect on IBS symptoms, as highlighted by the results of clinical studies performed in a total of 600 volunteers as well as a large scale consumer study run by prescribing physicians in over 1160 volunteers presenting symptoms of IBS.
“With over 800 million people affected by IBS worldwide, many of them unsatisfied with their current treatment, ibSium is now available as a substantiated natural alternative to drugs used in intestinal pain and discomfort management” added Jüsten.
Study details
The researchers, led by Prof. Robin Spiller from the Nottingham Digestive Diseases Centre, recruited 379 healthy volunteers presenting IBS symptoms according to the Rome III criteria to participate in their multi-centric randomized double-blind placebo-controlled trial. Participants were assigned to receive two daily doses of 500 mg of ibSium or a placebo for 12 weeks.
The results showed that, while no significant benefits were observed in the whole cohort, when the researchers limited the analysis to people with IBS-C, the ibSium group was found to experience a significant relief of their abdominal pain and discomfort versus the placebo group. They also felt significantly less bloated.
“Why S. cerevisiae benefits pain/discomfort remains quite unclear,” wrote the researchers. “While animal studies suggest it might reduce visceral hypersensitivity, the translation of such studies to benefit in clinical studies has a poor track record, so the relevance of the animal studies is quite unclear.
“Recent evidence supports the idea that pain in IBS-C increases as the number of days without bowel movements increases. This is possibly due to increasing pressure being required to propel the harder stool that results from slow transit. The increases in Bristol Stool Scale score we observed which make the stool softer may therefore account for the improvement in pain. Acceleration of transit in both small and large bowel has been linked to reduction in bloating, so this is a possible mechanism which could be tested in future studies.”
Source: United European Gastroenterology Journal
2015, DOI: 10.1177/2050640615602571
“Randomized double blind placebo-controlled trial of Saccharomyces cerevisiae CNCM I-3856 in Irritable Bowel Syndrome: improvement in abdominal pain and bloating in those with predominant constipation”
Authors: R.S. Spiller, F. Pélerin, et al.