Faecal transplants as a treatment for eating disorders

Welcome to the MHD newsletter. A 3-minute weekly read where you will be encouraged to get reflective with a journal prompt, have relevant reading suggestions with a new book each month and hear about nutrition in the news and what we have going on over in team MHD.

Weekly check in:

Is anyone else feeling a tad overwhelmed? 

Maybe it’s just me because I haven’t taken a break from work this summer. It just seems that there is an awful lot going on in the news, with the US election, our new PM, and lots of stories of violence in and around London! I think a need a media break for a bit.

Journal prompt for this week:

What foods or meals brought you joy as a child, that you haven’t had in a long time?

When working with people who have a difficult relationship with food this can be a nice gateway into enjoyment again.

I posted one of my childhood favourites on my Instagram page this week:

July Book of the month:

Somehow have arrived at our last July newsletter, which means finishing this book and finding a new one for August.

If you have been reading along, how have you found it?

I have folded over A LOT of pages that resonated and I wanted to come back to. Embodiment is relevant to our work as mental health and eating disorder dietitians. It is also relevant as human beings, it is a shared experience we have that impacts our experience of the world.

I strongly recommend picking up a copy of this book if you haven’t already.

Nutrition in the news:

“Aiming to Treat Anorexia with Faeces in Pill Form”

Have you heard of faecal transplants?

It is when we take stool from someone with ideal gut health, and transplant it (usually via colonoscopy, enema or oral capsules) into someone who has a disorder or infection impacted by their gut microbiome. It is currently most commonly used for treating a gut infection called C.Difficile.

The aim of treatment is to get the ideal balance of microbes from the donor to treat the condition or infection the patient is suffering from. It sounds like sci-fi but it is a treatment that has been studied for the past couple of decades, and continues to be considered as a future treatment for a range of conditions.

If you are someone with an excellent gut microbiota- you may wish to become a donor, and get paid for your poops!

Who needs to work when you could just sell your poop?

You can view the criteria to become a donor here

So how do this relate to eating disorders? I hear you ask.

We know that our gut microbiota and our mental health is closely linked, and we have research to show that those suffering from eating disorders have specific changes to the gut microbiota. Specialist Dietitian and researcher Namrata Dhopatkar says that they have identified particular strains of bacteria shown to cause a ‘drive for thinness’ in eating disorders.

So the hypothesis is that we may be able to support eating disorder recovery by making changes to the gut microbiota. The news article linked above reported that a pilot study to research this intervention has gained funding in Denmark, and we will soon start to form our understanding of this possible treatment approach in the future!

That’s all from us this week, back again same time next week.

Look after yourself <3

Sophie and the team at Mental Health Dietitians.

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