Table 2.

Studies investigating the effect of fiber supplementation in enteral nutrition on fecal microbiota

Ref.	Total microbiota count	Dominant group	Bifidobacteria	Others
Nakao et al[40], 2002	No change	↓ in aerobic bacteria	Not measured	Not measured
Schneider et al[18], 2006	↑	No change in composition of aerobic and anaerobic, gram positive and gram negative bacteria	No change	↑ in the numbers of enterococci at the end of the fiber-free EN
				↑ in the numbers of bacteroides at the end of the mixed fiber EN
Wierdsma et al[44], 2009	Not measured	Not measured	↓ In patients compared to healthy controls	Not measured
			Concentration remained stable in the FOS group but ↓ in the non-FOS group during intervention
Majid et al[17], 2013	No change	No change	No change	↓ Faecalibacterium prausnitzii and Bacteroides-Prevotella in the prebiotics group

EN: Enteral nutrition; FOS: Fructo-oligosaccharides.