Taking high-quality probiotics aims to rebalance your microbiota, an essential ecosystem often referred to as the ‘second brain’. The specific benefits for your wellbeing include:
- Improved digestive comfort: helps regulate bowel movements and significantly reduce bloating and abdominal discomfort. 93% of our customers experienced a reduction in bloating.
- Immune system support: a healthy gut microbiota is the body’s first line of defence. Our probiotics help to strengthen your natural defences. 74% of our customers felt an improvement in their immune system.
- Better nutrient absorption: by promoting a healthy gut environment, probiotics help your body to better absorb vitamins and minerals from your diet.
- Comprehensive synergistic action: Pure Bio² combines 6 strains of probiotics (Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium) with prebiotics (inulin and FOS) to nourish and strengthen beneficial bacteria.
An imbalance in the gut flora, or ‘dysbiosis’, can manifest in various ways. Pure Bio² is designed to support you if you experience:
- Recurrent digestive problems: irregular bowel movements (too frequent or too infrequent), pain and cramps, and difficulty digesting food.
- Susceptibility to infections: a feeling of weakened immune defences, or recurrent ear, nose and throat (ENT) or urinary tract problems.
- The consequences of a hectic lifestyle: stress, lack of sleep, pollution or an unbalanced diet, all of which can harm your gut flora.
- Following a course of antibiotics: antibiotics can disrupt the gut flora; a course of probiotics is therefore recommended to help restore it.
Pure Bio² is aimed at anyone wishing to look after their gut health and general wellbeing:
- People suffering from digestive discomfort (bloating, irregular bowel movements).
- Sportspersons: as intense physical exertion can upset the gut balance, taking probiotics helps to support the digestive system.
- People who are stressed or fatigued, whose lifestyle has a direct impact on the health of their microbiota.
- Anyone wishing to look after their health preventatively or following a course of antibiotics.
Why look after your microbiota?
Regarded as an organ in its own right, the microbiota weighs almost 1.5 kg and plays a vital role that extends far beyond digestion. Looking after it is essential because:
- It is at the heart of your immune system: a balanced microbiota is essential for effective natural defences.
- It influences your general well-being: there is constant communication between the gut and the brain. An imbalance can affect your mood and energy levels.
- It is essential for nutrition: it completes digestion and helps synthesise vital vitamins.
To ensure maximum effectiveness, Pure Bio² uses enteric-coated capsules (DR Caps®). This technology protects the probiotic strains from stomach acid, ensuring they are released specifically and intact directly into the digestive system, where they are most effective.
Gut microflora
The microflora comprises the collection of living microorganisms in our digestive tract. It consists of bacteria, yeasts and fungi.
Historically known as ‘intestinal flora’, the microbiota is our body’s largest surface area for exchange with the outside world, ahead of the skin.
Some key figures:
- Between 200 and 1,000 different bacterial species
- Up to 100 trillion bacteria
- An estimated weight of 1.5 kg
When the bacteria that make up our microbiota coexist with our body, this is referred to as symbiosis.
An imbalance in bacterial populations leads to dysfunctions that may be implicated in the development of various conditions.
It is therefore essential to maintain this gut ecosystem through a healthy and varied diet or by supplementing with specific probiotic strains, as each probiotic has a role to play.
The microbiota: a fragile balance subject to disruptions
The human body and the microbiota normally exist in a symbiotic relationship. However, disruptions to one can affect the other and throw the whole system out of balance.
Having formed during our early years, our microbiota stabilises in adulthood. This ‘organ’ is particularly influenced by the environment and diet, which can disrupt its symbiotic state: this is known as dysbiosis. The following external disturbances can alter these gut microorganisms:
- Intense exercise: whilst moderate physical activity reduces the risk of infection, intense exercise disrupts the microbial ecosystem.
- Stress and lack of sleep: whilst occasional stress can be beneficial in helping us push our limits, daily stress and fatigue disrupt the microbiota.
- Gastroenteritis: this digestive infection attacks the microbiota.
- Antibiotics: broad-spectrum antibiotics target a large number of bacteria, which can upset the balance of the microbiota. These treatments can cause dysbiosis, which may manifest as severe diarrhoea.
- Pollution, tobacco, alcohol and junk food. Several studies suggest that artificial sweeteners such as aspartame or sucralose alter the gut flora.
Intense exercise damages your gut microbiota
Whilst moderate physical activity reduces the risk of infection, intense exercise, on the other hand, damages the gut flora. Intense exercise leads to a lack of oxygen supply (hypoxia or ischaemia) to the gut, as blood flow is largely redirected to the muscles, the brain and the heart.
When exercise stops, the gut is reperfused: this is known as ‘ischaemia-reperfusion’. This blood flow causes a sudden and significant increase in oxygenation in the gut, leading to increased production of free radicals, which cause oxidative stress.
Intestinal hypoperfusion and oxidative stress simultaneously cause damage to intestinal cells and an increase in intestinal permeability. This intestinal permeability facilitates the passage of unwanted molecules into the bloodstream.
Look after your gut microbiota
1. Look after your lifestyle
- Move more during the day, exercise in a way that is gentle on your body, and take part in a balanced sporting activity.
- Get some fresh air; take time to breathe.
- Take time to sleep and rest.
- Take time to eat and chew your food.
2. Look after your eating habits
The foods you eat play an important role in the composition of your microbiota.
Fibre from vegetables and natural foods helps maintain a healthy microbiota. The Cretan diet, also more widely known as the Mediterranean diet, has beneficial effects on health.
It promotes the development of ‘good’ gut microbiota, particularly thanks to its high content of prebiotic nutrients (fructooligosaccharides, FOS) and fibre (pulses, fresh fruit and vegetables).
Spot the signs of dysfunction
Bacteria feed on the nutrients provided by our diet. A healthy diet is therefore a factor that promotes the health of the microbiota. This ecosystem, in turn, supports the body’s various vital physiological functions: immune defences, metabolism and vitamin synthesis.