Far from being obsolete, new research has shown that our appendix may help us recover from serious infections.

In December 2011 a group of researchers at Winthrop University Hospital on Long Island studied 254 patients with a history of gut infections caused by a deadly pathogen (C. difficile) often encountered in hospitals, especially when patients have been treated with prolonged courses of antibiotics.

Patients without an appendix were more than twice as likely to have a recurrent infection – recurrence in those with an appendix occurred in 18% of the cases, whereas in those without any appendix, recurrence occurred in 45 % of cases.

This has led to speculation that this tiny organ may be a store of beneficial bacteria – a “nature reserve” of beneficial bacteria – for when the friendly bacteria in our gut are depleted, as with the use of antibiotics.

 

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