St. Luke’s and The University of Texas School of Public Health Unite to Perform First Successful Adult Fecal Microbial Transplant
St. Luke’s Medical Center and The University of Texas School of Public Health in Houston announced today that they have successfully treated its first patient with a fecal microbial transplantation (FMT). The procedure was led by a team, including Herbert L. DuPont, MD, MACP, lead clinical investigator; F. Lyone Hochman, MD as the patient’s gastroenterologist; and Zhi Dong Jiang, MD, DrPH, laboratory investigator, who prepared the FMT.
The FMT procedure was performed on September 4 and follow-up treatments have helped relieve the symptoms of CDAD (Clostridium Difficile Associated Diarrhea or C diff) in 47-year-old Patricia Melancon of Liberty, Texas.
“The procedure was not difficult,” said Melancon. “Five days after the procedure, it was the best I’ve felt in the last year.”
CDAD or C diff is increasing dramatically in hospitals and nursing homes throughout the United States, Canada, and Europe. The intestinal infection causes severe diarrhea and can lead to kidney failure and/or death. Studies have shown that C diff-associated deaths in Texas have tripled over the past decade.
“Estimates suggest that we have 300-400 patients in Houston, and more than 1,700 patients in Texas, with this chronic intermittent disease. It leads to a miserable existence and requires recurrent hospitalization,” said Dr. DuPont. “A Fecal Microbial Transplant is the only effective way to give these patients back their everyday, normal lives.”
When a patient is first diagnosed with CDAD, antibiotics are used for treatment. After two or more recurrences, antibiotics usually are not helpful. Because the diversity of their microbiome—the good bacteria in the intestines—is reduced, a repletion of this good bacteria (or bacterial flora) is required for a cure. Currently, the only effective way to re-establish bacterial flora is the fecal microbial transplantation (FMT). In FMT, bacteria is isolated from the stool of a healthy patient and put into the lower intestine of the person with recurrent CDAD, in one single treatment. The success rate is more than 70 percent with recoveries that persist, and there are no known complications of FMT, although treated patients and donors are followed to ensure safety of the treatment.
“It’s our hope that our FMT program being developed here at St. Luke’s will lead to new treatments for this life-threatening condition,” said Dr. DuPont. “My hope is that we can begin to encourage more healthy individuals to become fecal donors, for the patients that need this procedure.”
St. Luke's Medical Center and The University of Texas School of Public Health are working together to develop an FMT program to treat patients with refractory & recurrent CDAD. People with chronic diarrhea from CDAD can contact St. Luke’s FMT program at 832-355-4122 to learn about the program and to see if they qualify.
If the patient qualifies for the program by having three or more bouts of CDAD, an appointment is scheduled with the program directors. St. Luke's has been working with payers and most are willing to recognize FMT as appropriate treatment for this condition.
