The Effect of Soy Consumption on 2:16-Hydroxyestrone Ratio in Postmenopausal Women Depends on Equol Production Status but is not influenced by Probiotic Consumption
Here’s some background…the body metabolizes estrogens down several pathways. The “2″ pathway is considered protective for certain types of cancer while the “16″ pathway is damaging. It is known that equols, compounds produced by bacterial conversion of soy isoflavones in the gut, shift the metabolization of estrogen to the 2 pathway (so does indole-3-carbonol from cruciferous veggies).
So, the idea in this study was to give probiotics with soy to see how much of an effect on equol levels was seen. There seems to be a subset of women that respond positively to this approach, but the researchers were not able to identify specifics. I do have a question for the more research-minded readers out there…
This study used a 2 week washout period. How can you get a washout period using probiotics? All things being healthy–the probiotics should maintain in the GI tract. I wonder how much this influenced the results?
