9 Best Probiotic Supplements for Mental Health

What Are Probiotics?

Probiotics are live microorganisms, and they’re found in supplements, fermented foods, and yogurt. Helpful bacteria can destroy cells that cause diseases, help your body digest food and produce vitamins. If you take a probiotic supplement, the microorganisms it contains are the same or similar to what naturally lives in your body.

Probiotics most commonly found in supplements belong to one of two broad groups—Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium. Sometimes, other bacteria are used in probiotic formulations. Yeasts like Saccharomyces boulardii are also used.

Probiotics can help your body maintain a healthy, diverse gut microbiome, produce substances with beneficial effects, and they can influence your immune response.

Some of the health conditions probiotics can include:

• Diarrhea associated with antibiotics
• diff infections
• Constipation
• Diverticular disease
• Inflammatory bowel disease
• Irritable bowel syndrome
• Traveler’s diarrhea
• Asthma
• Allergies
• Acne
• Upper respiratory infections
• Hepatic encephalopathy
• Urinary tract infections

Overall, probiotics are safe for most people to take and have a long history of safe use. Typically, if there are any risks associated with probiotics, it’s in people with very compromised immune systems or severe illnesses.

Probiotics and Mental Health

Probiotics have a significant effect on digestive health and your immune system. They are also increasingly shown to substantially impact the brain, mental health, and mood.

The gut and brain are connected via the gut-brain axis. There is signaling that goes back and forth between the enteric nervous system located in the digestive tract and the central nervous system, including the brain. The vagus nerve is the longest in the body and the connector between the gut and the brain.

The gut is often referred to as the second brain because it produces neurotransmitters as the brain does.

The gut produces dopamine, serotonin, and gamma-aminobutyric acid, all of which help regulate mood. It’s estimated that more than 90% of our total serotonin is in the gut.

If the brain senses that you’re in trouble, known as the fight-or-flight response, it sends signals to your gut. That effect is why many people experience digestive symptoms when anxious or upset. On the other side of that, if you have gastrointestinal conditions like IBS or IBD, it can also trigger mood disorders such as anxiety and depression.

Several studies have found that probiotics alone or combined with prebiotics may help with symptoms of depression and other mental health conditions.

In older people, daily supplementation with Bifidobacterium may help improve cognitive function, including attention and memory, and probiotics may generally help promote healthy aging.

In a study released at the end of 2022, researchers looked at the links between gut bacteria and depression.

Researchers identified various bacteria that could affect how people produce certain neurotransmitters, including the ones linked to depression, like glutamate.

How to Choose the Best Probiotic Supplements for Mental Health

Choosing a probiotic supplement, in general, can feel overwhelming. There are many different options, each with a unique combination of microorganisms.

The following are factors to keep in mind when choosing the best probiotic supplements for mental health or gut health.

Species

There are so many species of beneficial bacteria, but the best ones for mental health are listed above in the chart. The most common species in probiotic supplements include:

• These bacteria are primarily found in the small bowel. Probiotics with this species repopulate your small intestine and help with immune function and digestion. Lactobacillus acidophilus can support a healthy immune response in the gut, while L. rhamnosus helps with GABA expression. GABA is a neurotransmitter that helps you feel relaxed.
• This species is found mainly in your colon, also known as your large intestine. These produce butyrate, a short-chain fatty acid that helps your colon cells function correctly. Butyrate also helps with memory formation in the brain and plays a role in many metabolic processes. B. lactis and B. longum appear to be especially beneficial, and B. lactis can even help with weight loss or control.
• This is yeast, and it helps promote the health of your intestinal lining.

Quality

Choosing a quality probiotic is extremely important, and survival is critical. Probiotics are delicate; they need to survive everything they go through to reach your intestines, where they can benefit you.

This is where CFU is important. CFU stands for colony-forming unit, which we’ll talk more about, but the higher the number in each capsule, the better to improve potency.

A high-quality probiotic should make it through the stomach acid and release the contents into the proper intestinal environment.

It’s Better to Be in the Billions

A probiotic can have anywhere from 5 to 100 billion CFU in most cases, which is a measure of potency. More is better.

Diverse Species

A diverse gut is a healthy one, so you want as much diversity in the strains in your probiotic as you can find.

Avoid Fillers and Binders

Ensure you carefully read all the ingredients on the label and avoid products with fillers and binders like lactose that could cause symptoms such as bloating.

Shelf Life

Look at the expiration date or manufacturing date when you choose a probiotic. There are a lot of quality shelf-stable products that don’t require refrigeration.