How to improve effectiveness of treatment of patients with irritable bowel syndrome?

Abstract

This article discusses ways to improve the effectiveness of treatment of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), one of the most common functional gastrointestinal disorders (FGID). The significance of this issue is caused by high frequency of pathology detection among the young employable population and the difficulties in choosing an effective treatment that relieves not only the symptom severity, but also the frequency of relapses. Inadequate therapy reduces patients’ compliance with treatment and significantly worsens their quality of life. The choice of a drug that fails to provide a positive effect on all factors that form the pain syndrome is the most common reason for ineffective treatment. In addition, the measures aimed at managing such pathogenic factors as intestinal microbiota dysbiosis are often not taken. Meanwhile, numerous studies have shown that the intestinal microbiota imbalance is accompanied by increased intestinal permeability, which leads to the penetration of aggressive agents through extended intercellular spaces. This is accompanied by the occurrence of subclinical inflammation in the submucosal layer, which results in impaired motor function and increased visceral sensitivity. Thus, the intestinal microflora imbalance is one of the most important factors that form clinical symptoms of IBS. The article substantiates the advantages of using trimebutin, a gastrointestinal tract motility regulator, in functional gastrointestinal diseases from the standpoint of evidence-based medicine. The modern scientific knowledge on the  effectiveness of  microbiota  adjustment in  alleviating IBS symptoms is presented. In  particular, the  double-blind, placebo-controlled study has shown the efficacy of a multi-strain probiotic complex in relieving clinical symptom severity of IBS. The optimal treatment regimen for a patient with IBS should include a drug regulating the gastrointestinal motility and reducing visceral hypersensitivity and a probiotic complex containing bacterial strains that have proved their efficacy in this group of patients.