Doctor Reviews: Provitalize - Dr. Brian Yeung, ND (2024)

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Provitalize’s main marketing claims stem from the probiotics it contains. It’s supposed to be a “natural” way to lose weight, whatever that’s supposed to mean.

When people ask me about Provitalize, the underlying question most people should be asking here is: “Can probiotics help you lose weight?”

Well, can they? And do the specific probiotics in Provitalize do anything special? Let’s comprehensively review Provitalize for weight loss to see if it’s worth your money, see if we can replicate it with a cheaper alternative, and give it an overall rating.

How probiotics help with weight loss

Probiotics are a type of good bacteria, and there’s some evidence that certain probiotics strains are related to obesity, and might help with weight loss.

But it’s not going to be like suppressing your appetite so you eat less and start losing weight right away, kind of help.

It’s more like changing the way you metabolize nutrients so it reduces your risk of developing obesity, kind of help.

What I mean is that the type of benefits that probiotics typically impart, are beneath the surface and not easy to see. They often take effect much slower than most people will be able to notice.

These benefits are also highly dependent on the strains that are used, and not all probiotics are created equal.

Ingredients of Provitalize

So what strains are inside Provitalize? Let’s take a look at the list of ingredients. Here are the doses per capsule. The recommended dosing is two at breakfast, so that’s a daily dose of two per day.

Whenever supplements add ingredients into their product, there are three very common issues with many of these ingredients:

1. The doses are insufficient.
2. The types of extract they use are ineffective and don’t contain much of the active compounds.
3. The ingredient lacks evidence of any beneficial effect in humans.

When we analyze all these ingredients, we’re going to see which of these issues they have.

Probiotics in Provitalize

Let’s first take a look at the probiotic ingredients. 68.2 billion CFU isn’t bad, but it’s in what we call a proprietary blend.

Proprietary blends sometimes have special names like “Probiotic blend” or “Detox mix” that will list the ingredients within the blend, but not the exact doses of each ingredient.

You need to be very cautious about proprietary blends because they can list an ingredient, but only have trace amounts of it and you wouldn’t be able to tell since the dose isn’t listed.

It displays a lack of transparency, and may make an ingredient seem like there’s more inside than there actually is. This is why it’s a good idea to avoid proprietary blends or mixes.

What they’ve done here is combine three different probiotic strains together, and list one quantity, 68.2 billion CFU.

They’ve failed to list the quantity of each probiotic strain, which is important since you need to get enough of a probiotic strain if you want to gain its benefits.

It’s like me telling you: “I’m going to give a bunch of pennies and quarters, and there’s going to be 25 coins total.” But then I don’t tell you how much of each coin I give you. It makes a huge difference if I give you 24 pennies and 1 quarter, or 1 penny and 24 quarters.

Lactobacillus gasseri

Looking at the probiotic strains in Provitalize, we have three listed strains. Of the three, only Lactobacillus gasseri has some evidence that it might actually help some people lose weight.

Unfortunately, the effect was typically small and sometimes insignificant, with most people losing maybe an additional pound every month.

We cannot say if this supplement will even have the small and sometimes insignificant weight loss that Lactobacillus gasseri may impart, since we don’t know how much of the mix is that specific strain. For all we know, 95% of it could be one of the other strains, and we won’t even know.

B. breve and b. lactis

Bifidobacterium breve and bifidobacterium lactis don’t cause any weight loss by themselves, however studies found that they had some benefits that supported the health of those with obesity, like helping to improve fat composition or reducing inflammation, but these beneficial effects did not reliably translate to any additional weight being lost.

Beyond the probiotics, there isn’t really anything else in Provitalize that’s substantial for weight loss.

Turmeric and lecithin

Turmeric and lecithin have been studied for helping to reduce inflammation or cholesterol levels, things that are related to obesity, but aren’t going to be helping you lose weight.

Even then, the doses used in studies are measured in grams per day, the tiny amounts you’re getting in Provitalize aren’t going to do anything.

For example, there is some weak evidence to suggest that turmeric might help reduce inflammation in those with obesity. However the effective doses used in those trials were 1000 mg per day or above. The 350 mg per day Provitalize provides is just not going to cut it.

Moringa leaf and curry leaf

Moringa and curry leaves are really only known for their traditional uses, meaning that they were used by herbalists and holistic healers back in the day but currently lack much evidence-based research.

Their traditional uses include glucose control and reducing inflammation. There isn’t really any evidence that they actually help with those things, so it will be hard to determine their effectiveness, if any.

Even then, herbalists typically used 10 to 100 grams of these ground up leaves, not a few hundred milligrams like Provitalize uses.

BioPerine®

Bioperine is a standardized pepper extract and in this case it’s used to help improve the absorption of some of the other ingredients, but otherwise it has no therapeutic effects.

Provitalize Side Effects and Concerns

That being said, these ingredients, albeit not very useful, are relatively safe to use. There aren’t any major concerns from any of the listed ingredients, and assuming they don’t have any contamination issues or secretly put any illegal ingredients inside, only the probiotics may have some mild side effects in people.

Probiotics can sometimes cause mild gas and bloating in people who first start taking them, especially at high doses, as their body gets used to having new gut bacteria introduced into their gut. Sometimes it also causes some mild constipation or diarrhea, but it’s usually temporary as your body gets used to it.

Is Provitalize effective?

So, is Provitalize effective for weight loss? It’s likely not going to be much more effective than any general probiotic supplement.

Probiotics mainly help to support healthy weight loss for some people, but are not going to make you lose weight by itself.

This means you shouldn’t expect to lose weight by taking Provitalize, nor will it help you to eat less, or exercise more.

Rather, its effects, if any, will likely be much more subtle, potentially helping to improve your gut flora.

Whether it actually helps your gut will likely depend on your existing gut flora, so if you don’t have many gastrointestinal or health issues, and eat a healthy diet full of variety, it’ll probably have little to no benefits for you.

A Lactobacillus gasseri probiotic supplement can be purchased, and if your main goal is just weight loss, that’s probably good enough.

Overall review: Provitalize

Reviewing Provitalize by effectiveness for weight loss, I’m giving it a D. It basically works like any multi-strain probiotic to support healthy weight loss. It’s not really going to help you lose more weight, but may help support your gut during weight loss.

Reviewing Provitalize by cost, I’m giving it a D. It can be essentially replicated by getting individual probiotics at a cost many times less.

Reviewing Provitalize for safety, I’m giving it a B. Probiotics are relatively safe to take, and any gas and bloating you do experience will likely be mild and temporary.

Overall review, I’m giving Provitalize a D. I would not recommend it at all.

Top alternatives to Provitalize

If you’re looking to achieve similar effects, but better than those of Provitalize, I would combine a quality L. gasseri probiotic + turmeric extract.

• L. gasseri (BNR17) – 1 cap / day
• L. gasseri (generic) – 1 cap / day
• Turmeric (generic) – 2 to 4 caps / day
• Turmeric (Meriva) – 2 to 3 caps / day

Learn more about

• Which Probiotics are BEST for Weight Loss?
• 6 Things To Look For On Supplements
• 5 Things to Know Before Buying Weight Loss Supplements
• Other weight loss supplements

Citations

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Aoun A, Darwish F, Hamod N. The Influence of the Gut Microbiome on Obesity in Adults and the Role of Probiotics, Prebiotics, and Synbiotics for Weight Loss. Prev Nutr Food Sci. 2020;25(2):113-123. doi:10.3746/pnf.2020.25.2.113

Castaner O, Goday A, Park YM, et al. The Gut Microbiome Profile in Obesity: A Systematic Review. Int J Endocrinol. 2018;2018:4095789. Published 2018 Mar 22. doi:10.1155/2018/4095789

Choi IY, Kim J, Kim SH, Ban OH, Yang J, Park MK. Safety Evaluation of Bifidobacterium breve IDCC4401 Isolated from Infant Feces for Use as a Commercial Probiotic. J Microbiol Biotechnol. 2021;31(7):949-955. doi:10.4014/jmb.2103.03041

Davis CD. The Gut Microbiome and Its Role in Obesity. Nutr Today. 2016;51(4):167-174. doi:10.1097/NT.0000000000000167

Evans M, Njike VY, Hoxley M, et al. Effect of soy isoflavone protein and soy lecithin on endothelial function in healthy postmenopausal women. Menopause 2007;14:141-9.

Kadooka Y, Sato M, Ogawa A, et al. Effect of Lactobacillus gasseri SBT2055 in fermented milk on abdominal adiposity in adults in a randomised controlled trial. Br J Nutr. 2013;110(9):1696-1703. doi:10.1017/S0007114513001037

Kim J, Yun JM, Kim MK, Kwon O, Cho B. Lactobacillus gasseri BNR17 Supplementation Reduces the Visceral Fat Accumulation and Waist Circumference in Obese Adults: A Randomized, Double-Blind, Placebo-Controlled Trial. J Med Food. 2018;21(5):454-461. doi:10.1089/jmf.2017.3937

Mazloom K, Siddiqi I, Covasa M. Probiotics: How Effective Are They in the Fight against Obesity?. Nutrients. 2019;11(2):258. Published 2019 Jan 24. doi:10.3390/nu11020258

Minami J, Kondo S, Yanagisawa N, et al. Oral administration of Bifidobacterium breve B-3 modifies metabolic functions in adults with obese tendencies in a randomised controlled trial. J Nutr Sci. 2015;4:e17. Published 2015 May 4. doi:10.1017/jns.2015.5

Mousavi SM, Milajerdi A, Varkaneh HK, Gorjipour MM, Esmaillzadeh A. The effects of curcumin supplementation on body weight, body mass index and waist circumference: a systematic review and dose-response meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Crit Rev Food Sci Nutr 2020;60(1):171-80. doi: 10.1080/10408398.2018.1517724.

Park S, Bae JH. Probiotics for weight loss: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Nutr Res. 2015;35(7):566-575. doi:10.1016/j.nutres.2015.05.008

Pedret A, Valls RM, Calderón-Pérez L, et al. Effects of daily consumption of the probiotic Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis CECT 8145 on anthropometric adiposity biomarkers in abdominally obese subjects: a randomized controlled trial. Int J Obes (Lond). 2019;43(9):1863-1868. doi:10.1038/s41366-018-0220-0

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Taweerutchana R, Lumlerdkij N, Vannasaeng S, Akarasereenont P, Sriwijitkamol A. Effect of Moringa oleifera Leaf Capsules on Glycemic Control in Therapy-Naïve Type 2 Diabetes Patients: A Randomized Placebo Controlled Study. Evid Based Complement Alternat Med. 2017:6581390.

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