The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice), the UK's health regulator, has recommended a faecal microbiota transplant (FMT) to be offered to people who have been treated for two or more Clostridium difficile (C. diff) infections without success. Clostridium difficile is a bacterium that causes inflammation of the colon.
According to the institute, treating these people with gut bacteria taken from a healthy donor's poo will help to restore a healthy population of gut bacteria in sick patients.
“Our committee’s recommendation of this innovative treatment will provide another tool for health professionals to use in the fight against this infection, while at the same time balancing the need to offer the best care with value for money. Use of this treatment will also help reduce the reliance on antibiotics and in turn reduce the chances of antimicrobial resistance, which supports NICE’s guidance on good antimicrobial stewardship,” Mark Chapman, interim director of Medical Technology at NICE said.
According to the modeling, FMT treatment is cheaper than treatment with almost all antibiotics. Moreover, it saves £769 compared with vancomycin taper pulse (VTP) if FMT is given using colonoscopy. And saves £8,297 compared with vancomycin if it’s given using an oral capsule.