Prebiotic, probiotic, synbiotic – what’s the difference?
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All this technical gaga about bowel health can be enough to leave your head spinning. Naturopath Kathryn Terrill helps to wade through the lingo, and get to the heart of the information.
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The concept of ‘good bacteria’ for digestive health has become household knowledge amongst those interested in natural wellness. Growing scientific interest has meant there are more products and information out there about our little buddies than ever before.
In addition, the concepts around how ‘good bacteria’ assist our health in general have expanded to include some new terminology and technical focus. Herein lies the exploration of the terms prebiotic, probiotic, and synbiotic.
Probiotics – the ‘good bacteria’
The term probiotic means ‘for life,’ and was first used in 1965. The definition of a probiotic is a substance that contains alive, specific microorganisms (bacteria) that are present in sufficient numbers to alter the existing digestive environment and have beneficial health effects. There is an interesting history of use of living bacteria in food, particularly in milk products.
In the Persian version of the Old Testament it says that ‘Abraham owed his longevity to the consumption of sour milk.’ And in 76BC, the Roman historian Plinius recommended fermented milk products for gastroenteritis.
Recent research has provided some convincing evidence that probiotics are of particular assistance in the following areas:
- reducing the frequency and length of diarrhoea from antibiotic use, rotavirus infection, and traveller’s diarrhoea
- Supporting immunity
- Reducing the formation of unhealthy breakdown products in the bowel
Probiotics may also help to relieve allergic symptoms, Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) and constipation.
Prebiotics – the ‘growth stimulators’
Prebiotics is a term that exchanges the ‘pro’ for the ‘pre’, which means ‘before’ or ‘for’. A fitting name, because prebiotics are substances that stimulate the growth of our good friends, the probiotics.
Prebiotics are non-digestible food ingredients that selectively stimulate the growth or activity of the probiotics in the bowel. Examples of prebiotics include the substances fructooligosacharides, inulin, transgalactosylated oligosaccharides, and soybean oligosaccharides.
Synbiotics – a combination of the two
The term synbiotic refers to when a food or substance contains a prebiotic that specifically acts on the probiotic that is present also. This term comes from the word synergism. Theoretically, synbiotics are thought to offer additional benefit than just consuming a prebiotic or probiotic on its own.
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