U scientists ask: Can poop prevent diabetes?

Scientists at the University of Minnesota believe they can help people avoid diabetes — one of the nation’s most costly and crippling diseases — by salting their intestines with microorganisms from the bowels of healthy donors.

Call it a gut feeling.

It’s not as far-fetched as it may sound. Five years ago, U scientists pioneered the technique, known as stool transplants, for the treatment of Clostridium difficile colitis, a potentially deadly diarrheal disease that can result when most of the beneficial microorganisms in the gut get wiped out by antibiotics. It worked in more than nine out of 10 patients.

Now, the U is planning to spend $500,000 in a two-year test to see whether stool transplants could forestall diabetes. The disease has grown dramatically since the mid-1970s and affected 29.1 million Americans, or 9.3 percent of the population, in 2012. Another 86 million adults had “pre-diabetes,” a condition caused by the body’s insensitivity to insulin, which regulates blood sugar. Preventing diabetes or delaying its onset has the potential to save billions of dollars and reduce the incidence of related diseases affecting vision, the cardiovascular system, kidneys, nerves and skin. More Here: