by Steve Smithion

Created on: February 11, 2009   Last Updated: February 16, 2009

You may have heard of them from commercials, diet programmes, or maybe just the word "probiotic" plastered over food packaging simply caught your eye. Regardless, you can't have failed to notice that the benefits of probiotics are being highlighted more and more in today's world.

What's all the fuss about? We're becoming year on year without doubt more concerned about our health, given the prominence of obesity, heart related diseases and things of the sort, probiotics are just one of a whole host of dietary supplements that have been thrown into the spotlight. The exact science behind probiotics is somewhat complicated, however a simple understanding of how they work can help you realise their importance.

"Good" and "bad" bacteria are phrases I've no doubt you would of heard in connection with probiotics, and what this refers to is the balance of bacteria in the gut. Believe it or not, your gut contains around two pounds (one kilogram) of bacteria. It's hard to imagine isn't it? This large amount of bacteria is divided into the so-called "good bacteria" and "bad bacteria" and it's this balance of these two constituent microorganisms which decide the overall health of our gut.

For a healthy gut there should enough "good bacteria" to aid digestion and suppress the activities of "bad bacteria". In many of us, however, it is suffice to say that our lifestyles can sometimes have a detrimental effect on the health of our gut; poor diet, stress, food poisoning and the use of antibiotics can all disturb the balance, so for the everyday person leading a hectic and stressful lifestyle, keeping this balance in check requires additional assistance in the form of probiotics.

What probiotics do in simple terms is increase the numbers of "good" bacteria by encouraging their growth. By levelling out the imbalance of bacteria, probiotics can drastically improve the health of your digestive system and leave you feeling, on the whole, much healthier.

So where can I find probiotics? Due to the fact that probiotics are produced naturally by the fermentation of, for example, milk the best foods are usually products such as yogurt and butter/margarine spreads. Replacing a snack you usually have each day with a product enriched with probiotics will ensure a healthy gut and is a simple way of keeping the consumption of probiotics consistent.

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