Probiotics to Prevent Respiratory Infections in Nursing Homes: A Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial
Bibliographic record
Abstract
OBJECTIVES: To assess the feasibility of conducting a large clinical trial to evaluate the effectiveness of probiotics to reduce influenza and other respiratory virus infections in residents of long-term and chronic care facilities (LTCFs). DESIGN: Randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled pilot trial. SETTING: Fourteen nursing homes in Hamilton and surrounding region, Ontario, Canada. PARTICIPANTS: Nursing home residents aged 65 and older (N=209). Those who were taking immunosuppressives (steroids or other immunosuppressives) or had a hematological malignancy, structural heart disease, or gastroesophageal or intestinal injury and others at high risk of an endovascular infection were excluded. INTERVENTION: Participants were randomized to receive study probiotics-2 capsules of Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG (estimated 10 billion colony forming units of L. rhamnosus GG per capsule) or placebo (calcium carbonate) daily for 6 months. MEASUREMENTS: Laboratory-confirmed respiratory viral infections. RESULTS: One hundred ninety-six individuals were included in the analysis: 100 in the probiotics group and 96 in the placebo group. Laboratory-confirmed respiratory viral infections were observed in 14 (15.0%) residents in the probiotic group and 21 (22.9%) in the placebo group (hazard ratio=0.65, 95% confidence interval=0.32-1.31). CONCLUSION: A larger trial is warranted to determine whether probiotics reduce influenza and other respiratory virus infections in residents of LTCFs.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.005 | 0.006 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.003 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.007 | 0.001 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".