Meta-Analysis
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2018. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Gastroenterol. Jan 7, 2018; 24(1): 139-149
Published online Jan 7, 2018. doi: 10.3748/wjg.v24.i1.139
Probiotic monotherapy and Helicobacter pylori eradication: A systematic review with pooled-data analysis
Giuseppe Losurdo, Rossella Cubisino, Michele Barone, Mariabeatrice Principi, Gioacchino Leandro, Enzo Ierardi, Alfredo Di Leo
Giuseppe Losurdo, Rossella Cubisino, Michele Barone, Mariabeatrice Principi, Enzo Ierardi, Alfredo Di Leo, Section of Gastroenterology, Department of Emergency and Organ Transplantation, University “Aldo Moro”, Piazza Giulio Cesare, Bari 70124, Italy
Gioacchino Leandro, National Institute of Gastroenterology, “S De Bellis” Research Hospital, Via Turi, Castellana Grotte (BA) 70013, Italy
Author contributions: Losurdo G, Leandro G, Ierardi E and Di Leo A conceived the study; Losurdo G, Cubisino R, Barone M and Principi M collected the data; Losurdo G and Leandro G performed the statistical analysis; Losurdo G, Cubisino R and Ierardi E wrote the manuscript; All authors revised the manuscript and approved the final version.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors declare no conflict of interest.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Enzo Ierardi, MD, Professor, Section of Gastroenterology, Department of Emergency and Organ Transplantation, University “Aldo Moro”, Piazza Giulio Cesare 11, Bari 70124, Italy. e.ierardi@virgilio.it
Telephone: +39-80-5593452 Fax: +39-80-5593088
Received: October 7, 2017
Peer-review started: October 9, 2017
First decision: October 25, 2017
Revised: November 13, 2017
Accepted: November 21, 2017
Article in press: November 21, 2017
Published online: January 7, 2018
Processing time: 91 Days and 18.1 Hours
Core Tip

Core tip: Despite several lines of evidence in the literature having demonstrated a pivotal role of probiotics as adjunctive treatment for Helicobacter pylori (H. pylori) eradication, national and international guidelines do not have a uniform consensus about their clinical application. Many meta-analyses have confirmed that co-administration of probiotics may have a beneficial effect on the prevention of side effects and eradication rates. Herein, we found that probiotic monotherapy may eradicate H. pylori in 14% of cases. Lactobacilli, Saccharomyces boulardii and multistrain combinations eradicated the bacterium with a rate of 16%, 12% and 14%, respectively. Probiotics were significantly more effective than placebo (OR = 7.91).