IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pone00/0166232.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Clinical and Economic Impact of Probiotics Consumption on Respiratory Tract Infections: Projections for Canada

Author

Listed:
  • Irene Lenoir-Wijnkoop
  • Laetitia Gerlier
  • Denis Roy
  • Gregor Reid

Abstract

Introduction: There is accumulating evidence supporting the use of probiotics, which are defined as “live micro-organisms which, when administered in adequate amounts, confer a health benefit on the host”, as a preventive measure against respiratory tract infections (RTI). Two recent meta-analyses showed probiotic consumption (daily intake of 107 to 1010 CFU in any form for up to 3 months) significantly reduced RTI duration, frequency, antibiotic use and work absenteeism. Objectives: The aim of this study was to assess the impact of probiotic use in terms of number of RTI episodes and days averted, and the number of antibiotic prescriptions and missed workdays averted, in the general population of Canada. In addition, the corresponding economic impact from both a healthcare payer and a productivity perspective was estimated. Methods: A microsimulation model was developed to reproduce the Canadian population (sample rate of 1/1000 = 35 540 individuals) employing age and gender. RTI incidence was taken from FluWatch consultation rates for influenza-like illness (2013–14) and StatCan all-cause consultations statistics. The model was calibrated on a 2.1% RTI annual incidence in the general population (5.2 million RTI days) and included known risk factors (smoking status, shared living conditions and vaccination status). RTI-related antibiotic prescriptions and work absenteeism were obtained from the literature. Results: The results indicate that probiotic use saved 573 000–2.3 million RTI-days, according to the YHEC–Cochrane scenarios respectively. These reductions were associated with an avoidance of 52 000–84 000 antibiotic courses and 330 000–500 000 sick-leave days. A projection of corresponding costs reductions amounted to Can$1.3–8.9 million from the healthcare payer perspective and Can$61.2–99.7 million when adding productivity losses. Conclusion: The analysis shows that the potential of probiotics to reduce RTI-related events may have a substantial clinical and economic impact in Canada.

Suggested Citation

  • Irene Lenoir-Wijnkoop & Laetitia Gerlier & Denis Roy & Gregor Reid, 2016. "The Clinical and Economic Impact of Probiotics Consumption on Respiratory Tract Infections: Projections for Canada," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(11), pages 1-16, November.
  • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0166232
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0166232
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0166232
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0166232&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pone.0166232?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Irene Lenoir-Wijnkoop & Laetitia Gerlier & Jean-Louis Bresson & Claude Le Pen & Gilles Berdeaux, 2015. "Public Health and Budget Impact of Probiotics on Common Respiratory Tract Infections: A Modelling Study," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 10(4), pages 1-17, April.
    2. Marina L Ritchie & Tamara N Romanuk, 2012. "A Meta-Analysis of Probiotic Efficacy for Gastrointestinal Diseases," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 7(4), pages 1-11, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. David H. Nelson & Susan L. Prescott & Alan C. Logan & Jeffrey S. Bland, 2019. "Clinical Ecology—Transforming 21st-Century Medicine with Planetary Health in Mind," Challenges, MDPI, vol. 10(1), pages 1-16, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Meng-Meng Liu & Shu-Ting Li & Yan Shu & He-Qin Zhan, 2017. "Probiotics for prevention of radiation-induced diarrhea: A meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(6), pages 1-15, June.
    2. Sabina Fijan & Anita Frauwallner & László Varga & Tomaž Langerholc & Irena Rogelj & Mateja Lorber & Peter Lewis & Petra Povalej Bržan, 2019. "Health Professionals’ Knowledge of Probiotics: An International Survey," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(17), pages 1-16, August.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0166232. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: plosone (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/plosone/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.