Many women out there battle UTIs constantly and that’s really unfortunate! After all, the symptoms are really painful and uncomfortable so going to the doctor to get something prescribed for relief only to experience a urinary tract infection again after a while is really frustrating and confusing.
That being said, it makes sense you’d want to know why it keeps on happening, again and again!
Well, here you may find the answer but keep in mind that it’s going to shock you!
As it turns out, the antibiotic you are taking for your UTI may actually be responsible for you getting another UTI after a while!
That’s right! According to a new study, reoccurring UTIs have to do with gut health and the medicine prescribed only makes it worse!
A bacteria found in your intestines, E. coli, can find its way to the urinary tract, as per ScienceDaily, causing UTIs.
So when diagnosed with a UTI and getting prescribed an antibiotic for it, it makes sense that it will make you feel better – for a while!
Unfortunately, Harvard Health, has pointed out that around 25 to 30 percent of women get a UTI again within 6 months’ time!
A new study by the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard shows that the gut microbiome might just be the cause of this unending cycle of UTIs you have been experiencing.
More precisely, the study published in Nature Microbiology concluded that women who go through a cycle of recurring UTIs might be stuck in this situation because of the very antibiotic they get prescribed to fight it in the first place.
The scientists learned that the medicine is able to clear out the bacteria from the bladder but not from the intestines.
That being said, the microbiome left in the gut can then grow and spread to the bladder once again.
In other words, the antibiotics end up creating chaos amongst the “good bacteria” in the gut, leading to more infections.
Co-senior author of the study Scott J. Hultgren explained that “It is frustrating for women coming in to the doctors with recurrence after recurrence after recurrence, and the doctor, typically male, gives them advice about hygiene. That is not necessarily what the problem is. It is not necessarily poor hygiene that is causing this. The problem is in the disease itself, in this connection between gut and the bladder and levels of inflammation. Basically, physicians do not know what to do with recurrent UTI. All they have is antibiotics, so they just throw more antibiotics at the problem, which probably makes things worse.”
