Fecal microbiota transplantation: Applications and challenges in India

Abstract

Fecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT) involves a noninvasive technique of transferring fecal microbiota in patients from healthy donors. Donors are generally chosen from spouses or relatives, though the anonymous donation is also common. FMT is particularly useful in diseases like recurrent clostridium difficile infection, ulcerative colitis, hepatic encephalopathy, metabolic syndrome, autism spectrum disorders, anxiety, graft versus host disease, multiple sclerosis, multi drug resistance etc. FMT is gradually being adapted in India in the major cities but there are various regulatory challenges. Despite the promising nature of FMT in different pathologies, the different barriers ranging from the selection of a healthy donor, high quality control, uniform protocol maintenance, to ensuring effective mode of administration have to be addressed for FMT to become a widely accepted modality of therapy.