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In Search Of A Healthy Gut, One Man Turned To An Extreme DIY Fecal Transplant (theverge.com)
Josiah Zayner writes: Arielle Duhaime-Ross at The Verge followed Dr. Josiah Zayner, a former Scientist at NASA turned BioHacker, as he attempted the first ever full-body microbiome transplant. She writes "Over the course of the next four days, Zayner would attempt to eradicate the trillions of microbes that lived on and inside his body -- organisms that helped him digest food, produce vitamins and enzymes, and protected his body from other, more dangerous bacteria. Ruthlessly and methodically, he would try to render himself into a biological blank slate. Then, he would inoculate himself with a friend's microbes -- a procedure he refers to as a 'microbiome transplant.'".
Totally different, probiotics usually have assorted bacteria that are usually not associated with a healthy or unhealthy gut. Microbiomes, like those of the gut function as communities meaning you can't just add one or two species and hope everything is better(at least not from what we know at the moment). Using a fresh poop sample increases the chances that not only will a transplant take but also that the beneficial microbes will be there in the appropriate amounts to be beneficial.
Probiotics are typically a supplement, trying to boost established levels of a couple of specific strains. Wiping out his microbiome and replacing it with a couple of strains probably wouldn't be the best idea... He's trying to replace his microbiome with all the strains present from a healthy one.
While I can see this working I wonder how important the balance between each strain would be to replicate the healthy microbiome. After all, there is no guarantee on the numbers each strain will establish themselves to.
As a simple example, in freshwater aquaculture and aquaponics you attempt to establish bacterial populations to convert toxic ammonia excreted by fish and decomposing waste into nitrites and eventually into nitrates which feed your crops. Fail to get the balance of nitrifying bacteria right and your system fails (plants die, fish die).
There has been research. The treatment is currently approved for C. difficile. Of course the FDA couldn't wait to jump in and slow down the research.
Delivery methods include a nasal tube, an enema, scope, and enteric coated pills or capsules. The latter is probably the simplest and doesn't release the payload until it is past the stomach.
Except that yoghurt is primarily made from yeast
No. This is wrong. Yogurt is made with bacteria. You can read all about it on Wikipedia, where the very first sentence explains that yogurt is made with bacterial fermentation.
any bacteria it has are very unlikely to be bacteria normally found in the gut.
Wrong again. Many of the bacteria commonly found in yogurt are also found in mammalian guts. Here is one example but there are many others.
RTFA. He had tried diet alteration already. Though granted, probably not thoroughly given his somewhat casual proclivities. Not that I can blame him: chronic intestinal distress eats away at your willpower and mental acuity quite severely over time. It's very hard to stay rational with a constant worm in your stomach. I can totally sympathize with the level of desperation that drove him to this. So, if doctor's don't want us nearly-schizophrenic IBS-ravaged patients turning to crazy DYI procedures, getting this area of medicine more science and evidence should be a priority, rather than giving us diazepam-laced anti-cholergenic cocktails, probably an antidepressant, and telling us to "avoid stress" (hah!), essentially treating it as a purely neurological problem.
Someone had to do it.