OpenDialog July 2026 – Issue Three This month’s Q&A features the CEO and Co-Founder of the Peggy Lillis Foundation (PLF), the leading nonprofit organization that is building a nationwide C. diff (Clostridioides difficile) awareness movement by educating the public, empowering advocates, and shaping policy. He is Christian John Lillis, a tireless advocate, fundraiser and thought […]

OpenDialog May 2026 – Issue Two Patient outcomes may depend on science that’s moving faster than any of us can track. OpenBiome Foundation’s monthly newsletter cuts through the noise – delivering focused conversations in Q&A format with leading researchers and clinicians on the microbiome discoveries most relevant to your practice. No jargon, no fluff. Just […]

Studies of the microbes living on and in our bodies are conducted mainly in a few rich countries, squandering opportunities to improve the health of people globally.

By Neil Stollman, MD

Stollman is chief of the Division of Gastroenterology at the Alta Bates Summit Medical Center and works at the East Bay Center for Digestive Health, both in Oakland, California.

Twenty years ago, a respected colleague asked me to perform a “poop transplant” on a local schoolteacher with multiply recurrent C. difficile infection.  I was incredulous and skeptical, but my colleague (a friend but a forceful one) persisted until I ultimately acquiesced.