Study by the Italian University of Ferrara at the Hospital of Santa Anne di Ferrara “Testing Bio-Stabilizing Agents Using Probiotic Products For Hospital Cleaning And Sanitation”

Date: 5/24/2019

The problem of hospital infections

Hospital-acquired infections are one of the most common health problems: patients need to stay in hospital for longer, spend more money on treatment, national health budgets suffer, limiting the use of modern, other procedures or methods.

The study was conducted in Italy, where it is estimated that hospital infection is as high as 8%. approximately 700,000 cases per year. Approximately 25% of the cases occurred after the operation and the remaining 75% occurred during hospitalization or after the patient’s release home. The data are above the statistical average for Europe and North America.

These hospital infections can be caused by microorganisms such as salmonella or hepatitis, but increasingly by opportunistic microorganisms. Hospital environment clean-up procedures along with prophylactic antibiotic treatment are carried out to reduce the proliferation of microorganisms and thus prevent the development of potential infections.

The problem is typical for all medical institutions in any country, so the attempt by Italian scientists is worthy of attention and confirms the valuable role of probiotics in combating unfavorable microorganisms in our environment.

Chemical disinfection – a method of the past

Traditionally, cleaning procedures are carried out using chemical disinfectants, but there are several disadvantages of this method:

  • Over time, the biocidal (anti-bacterial) efficacy of disinfectants is limited. This usually ends in 20-30 minutes after the surface is applied, followed by an exponential growth of microorganisms.
  • Microorganisms continue to develop genetic mutations and their own defense, which aims to make biocidal effects ineffective. This increases antibiotic resistance and / or resistance to many drugs
  • Environmental pollution problems arising from the massive accumulation of toxic chemicals in the environment, sewage systems, further groundwater, and so on.

The principle of biological competition is the future of the fight against pathogenic bacteria

For these reasons, international research on sanitation methods based on the principle of biological competition is intensifying. Its essence: non-pathogenic microorganism products can colonize the surface and fight the spread of other (bad) bacteria species. This is based on the principle of competitive exclusion (Gause Law).

This approach to sanitation alters the essence of traditional procedures. So far, disinfection is defined by the minimum presence of any microorganisms on any type of surface. Although the traditional method aims to control pathogenic strains, it does so without tolerance to the presence of microorganisms, even those that are not harmful to human health. These new procedures can be defined as one type of bio-stabilization methods, which means that there is no overall biocidal (all micro-organism-destroying) effect, except for the ultimate impact on certain microbial species harmful to humans. The principle of action is that two different types of bacteria cannot survive if they require the same nutritional conditions to multiply. The role of human-friendly microorganisms becomes very important – to overcome pathogenic bacteria in the competitive struggle, to take up the place, without harming the general ecology.

Cleansers with probiotics are not a sterile but human-friendly environment

Cleansing agents containing probiotics, the good colonizers of our environment, prevent the growth of bad bacteria.

University research uses cleaning products that contain a mixture of spores of the genus Bacillus. High concentration of good bacteria can effectively promote competition against all other microorganisms, The survey was conducted in 2010. – 2011 In vitro work was done at Ferrara University Laboratories, and field work in real life at the Santa Anna di Ferrara Hospital. The purpose of “in vitro” tests (carried out in accordance with ISO 13697: 2001) was to allow the effectiveness of the competitive separation of probiotics to be checked against other bacterial species in the absence of external factors, i. e. those processes contaminated by surfaces that occur naturally, in this case, in a hospital environment.

The results confirm that it is clear that the use of probiotics leads to a general reduction in the number of pathogens compared to traditional procedures – they are able to compete effectively with bad bacteria, providing long-term protection. After two months of use, it has been found that long-term probiotics have caused a significant reduction in pathogenic microbes compared to sites that have been treated with conventional aggressive chemicals. In most cases, the population of pathogenic micro-organisms has been reduced by almost 90%, and the average overall pathogen reduction compared to traditional disinfectants is over 70-80%.

Our responsible attitude to the safe environment for man is essential

Tests conducted by Italian university scientists confirm that good bacteria – probiotics – are able to compete with pathogenic microorganisms and create a human-friendly and safe environment for a long time. What’s more, we can avoid unwanted sterility, which has been proven by several scientific studies. Let’s add that we do not release in nature aggressive chemistry, and we have science and research-based facts that encourage us to rethink about cleaning, washing, and other cleaning products we use.

Probiotic – products for caring and responsible users

Vilnius University (VU) researchers conducted a similar study with “Probiotic” products that use the same genus as the Italian bacteria. The VU study focused not on all but the most active E.coli pathogenic bacteria. The aim of the researchers was to evaluate the effectiveness of “Probiotic” cleaner: to study the effect of “Probiotic” cleaner on the growth of E.coli bacteria and to investigate the stability of microorganisms used in “Probiotic” cleaners. The study substantiated the competitive advantage of probiotics against the pathogenic E.coli bacteria: under the same conditions, the microorganisms in the “Probiotic” sample remain viable and the E.coli bacteria do not show signs of life after 24 hours. This means that by using “Probiotic” cleaner with probiotics in our household, we create a human-friendly environment: a) probiotics, or good bacteria, remain viable b) bad E.coli bacteria do not survive, i.e. the likelihood of infection with bacterial intestinal diseases decreases in the household.

No matter which country’s scientists are researching, probiotics prove their benefits to humans every time they fight against bacteria harmful to our body.

SOURCE: https://probiosanus.com/en/science-about-the-effectiveness-of-probiotic-cleaners-and-long-term-results/