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Nutrition in acute and chronic diseases

Effect of Lactobacillus casei on lipid metabolism and intestinal microflora in patients with alcoholic liver injury

Abstract

Background

The present study aims to investigate the effect of Lactobacillus casei on lipid metabolism and intestinal microflora in patients with alcoholic liver injury.

Methods

In a double-blind randomized controlled trial, 158 recruited alcoholic liver injury patients were randomized to three treatments for 60 days: low-dose group (LP, n = 58, 100 ml of Lactobacillus casei strain Shirota (LcS)), high-dose group (HP, n = 54, 200 ml of LcS), and positive control group (PC, n = 46, 100 ml of special drinks without active Lactobacillus casei). Another group of 20 healthy people was served as normal control group (NC).

Results

The serum levels of TG and LDLC in the HP group were significantly decreased by 26.56% and 23.83%, respectively than those in the PC group (P < 0.05). After supplementation of Lactobacillus casei, there was a significant increase in the amount of Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium when compared with the PC group (P < 0.05).

Conclusions

Supplementation of Lactobacillus casei can improve lipid metabolism and regulate intestinal flora disorders in patients with alcoholic liver injury.

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Fig. 1: Changes of liver function and lipid metabolism before and after intervention.
Fig. 2: The quantitative test results of the six bacteria in the intestinal flora.

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Funding

This work was funded and supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 81573137 and 81872605).

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HL, YL, and XL conceived and designed the experiments; XL, XG, HZ, YM, and YL performed experiments and analyzed the data. HL and YL were responsible for the critical review of the study design, protocol, and methodology, providing scientific advice to this study. XL and YL contributed to interpreting the data as well as writing and editing the manuscript. All authors approved the final version of the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Hui Liang.

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Li, X., Liu, Y., Guo, X. et al. Effect of Lactobacillus casei on lipid metabolism and intestinal microflora in patients with alcoholic liver injury. Eur J Clin Nutr 75, 1227–1236 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41430-020-00852-8

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