Table 1.

Reviews obtained from the search into “probiotics”

Probiotics	Author's conclusions	Ref.
Treating acute infectious diarrhea	Beneficial effects	[109]
Prevention of pediatric antibiotic associated diarrhea	Evidence of a protective effect	[110]
Treating persistent diarrhea in children	Limited evidence	[111]
Treatment of Clostridium difficile (C. difficile)-associated colitis in adults	Insufficient evidence	[112]
Prevention of C. difficile-associated diarrhea in adults and children	Moderate quality evidence	[113]
Prevention of necrotizing enterocolitis in preterm infants	Prevents severe necrotizing enterocolitis	[114]
Induction of remission in ulcerative colitis	Limited evidence	[115]
Treatment and prevention of pouchitis after ileal pouch-anal anastomosis for chronic ulcerative colitis	Probiotic VSL#3 was more effective than placebo	[116]
Maintenance of remission in ulcerative colitis	Insufficient evidence	[117]
Maintenance of remission in Crohn's disease	No evidence	[118]
Induction of remission in Crohn's disease	Insufficient evidence	[119]
Prevention of post-operative recurrence of Crohn's disease	Insufficient randomized trials	[120]
Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and/or steatohepatitis	Lack of randomized clinical trials	[121]
Patients with hepatic encephalopathy	Need of efficacy demonstration	[122]
Treatment of bacterial vaginosis	No sufficient evidence	[123]
Preventing preterm labour	Insufficient data	[124]
For prevention of allergic disease and food hypersensitivity (in infants)	Insufficient evidence	[125]
Treating eczema	No effective treatment	[126]
Preventing acute upper respiratory tract infections	Limited evidence	[127]

Reviews obtained from the search into “probiotics” in the Cochrane Library (http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/cochranelibrary/search) of the Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews journal.