Vitamin Producing Lactic Acid Bacteria as Complementary Treatments for Intestinal Inflammation

Background: Current therapies for against inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are sometimes limited by high costs, high toxicities and/or undesirable side effects, reasons for which new treatments are constantly being developed and studied. In this regards, an increasing mass of data has demonstrated that fecal transplantations and probiotic supplementations have shown promising effects and could be considered as adjunct IBD treatments to decrease some of the unwanted side effects caused by primary treatments. Furthermore, there is also mounting evidence that suggests that certain vitamins could provide antiinflammatory effects and it has been shown that certain strains of lactic acid bacteria (LAB), the most commonly used probiotic microorganisms, can produce biologically active forms of certain vitamins. Objective: To discuss the potential role of the vitamin-producing LAB on intestinal inflammatory diseases. Method: A thorough search of bibliographic databases for peer-reviewed research on the effect of vitamins produced by LAB on inflammatory processes was performed. Results: There is mounting research that vitamin producing LAB could provide antiinflammatory effects. Conclusion: The potential role of vitamin producing LAB was discussed not only because they could be used to decrease inflammation but also because they could provide the host with essential nutrients that are normally deficient in IBD patients due to altered intestinal morphologies.