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Gut microflora from a donor can trigger metabolic disorders
Last reviewed: 02.07.2025
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After scientists proved that transplanting fecal matter from a donor into the gastrointestinal tract of a patient with severe intestinal disorders, when antibacterial therapy was ineffective or did not help at all, is a good treatment method and does not cause any side effects, this procedure became quite popular.
Recently, this method of treatment has been recommended to more and more people. However, one of the latest cases of transferring fecal matter with beneficial bacteria to a woman diagnosed with a recurrent bacterial infection has shown that the choice of donor should be approached more responsibly.
The fact is that the donor who provided his beneficial microflora had problems with excess weight. After the procedure, the woman's intestinal bacterial composition returned to normal, but three years after the treatment, specialists diagnosed her with obesity.
Transplantation of normal intestinal flora from a donor is usually performed to treat infections caused by Clostridium difficile bacteria. These anaerobic gram-positive bacteria are the main causative agents of severe infectious diseases of the rectum, which often develop after the destruction of normal microflora due to antibiotic treatment. When transplanting fecal matter from a donor, the recipient's gastrointestinal tract is filled with beneficial microflora, which allows almost complete elimination of the infection.
Experts have proven more than once that bacteria in the gastrointestinal tract play an important role in the metabolic process.
It is worth noting that before the transplant of fecal matter from the donor, the woman had no problems with excess weight, but almost a year and a half after the procedure, she began to have visible problems with her weight.
Special dietary nutrition and physical exercise did not show results, and three years after successfully getting rid of the bacterial infection, the woman was diagnosed with obesity. At the same time, doctors cannot help, according to them, several additional studies need to be conducted to understand what caused the metabolic disorder. Perhaps there was something in the transplanted substance that affected the woman's metabolic processes, or the beneficial microflora of the donor caused metabolic disorders.
As experiments on rodents have shown, transplantation of donor fecal matter with beneficial microflora from obese mice to individuals without weight problems led to the development of obesity in the recipient rodents.
But experts admit that the weight gain could have occurred against the background of active use of antibiotics, which are taken to treat bacterial infections; the influence of other factors is also not excluded.
The procedure of fecal transplants with beneficial bacteria is gaining popularity in the United States, where in 2014 the world's first bank of fecal samples was opened that can be used to treat diseases caused by the bacteria Clostridium difficile.
Work is currently ongoing in this direction and experts are confident that fecal transplantation will help cope with diseases such as obesity, Parkinson's disease, and rheumatoid arthritis.
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