Urinary tract infections (UTIs) are the most common bacterial infection experienced by women. Approximately 50 to 60% of all women in the United States will be diagnosed with UTIs at least once in their lifetime.
Many of them develop recurrent infections; the frequency tends to increase with age. UTIs can be treated with antimicrobial drugs, although not without complications. The treatment of community-acquired UTI is becoming more complicated because of the increased incidence of multi-drug-resistant Escherichia coli, the most common cause of UTI. In this case series, we provided SUPERMANNAN (250 mg of dried, dead autolyzed yeast per capsule) to 9 women with acute and chronic UTI episodes. All patients were previously diagnosed with multiple episodes of culture-positive urinary tract infections (UTIs), placed on empirical immediate antibiotic status, and given open prescription orders by their urologists. Therapy consisted of an initial dose of 2 capsules, and then 2 additional capsules every 20 minutes for the next 2 hours, and then 2 capsules every 12 hours for the next 24 hours (total of 18 capsules in 24 hours). All women experienced UTI symptom relief within an hour and a lower frequency of recurrence after therapy. Six subjects had no adverse effects, and 3 had minimal side effects (mild, self-limiting urinary urgency without acute UTI attacks). These preliminary results suggest the oral ingestion of mannan oligosaccharides for preventing or ameliorating bacterial UTIs is feasible, and it may provide symptom relief from acute UTIs while reducing the frequency of subsequent episodes. These hypotheses should be tested in follow-up, randomized trials.
KEYWORDS: Yeast Mannan oligosaccharide, dietary supplement, acute urinary tract infections, urinary tract infection, acute, case series
CORRESPONDENCE: Michael McCulloch, LAc, MPH, PhD (Epidemiology), Independent, San Rafael, CA, United States ( )
CITATION: UroToday Int J. 2012 October;5(5):art 50.
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.3834/uij.1944-5784.2012.10.09