Probiotics may be effective in children with infantile colic, irritable bowel syndrome, necrotizing enterocolitis, food allergy, and nonalcoholic fatty liver disease

In October 2019 researchers from Italy published their review on the effectiveness of probiotics in many common diseases in children. There is increasing evidence that probiotics may be of benefit in children but with the wide variety of probiotics available and contradictory data in the literature, it is difficult to know whether or probiotics can be used and, if so, what to choose. Recent findings indicate that Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG and Saccharomyces boulardii I-745 may be effective in the treatment of acute infectious diarrhoea, Lactobacillus reuteri DSM 17938 in infantile colic, Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG, and VSL#3 in irritable bowel syndrome. In addition, there have been recent  encouraging results for the use of probiotics in necrotizing enterocolitis, food allergy, and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease. However, information on the effectiveness of probiotics for constipation is not clear.  

Sansotta N et al. The good bugs: the use of probiotics in pediatrics. Curr Opin Pediatr. 2019 Oct;31(5):661-669.

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