About Stig Bengmark

Stig Bengmark was born in 1929 in a small chapel in Östervåla outside Uppsala and grew up with parents who lived a very healthy life. When the time came for Stig to choose an education, he was torn: should he become a psychologist or, possibly, a psychiatrist? No, Stig chose instead to train as a surgeon – and how fortunate that turned out to be! In fact Stig would go on to become professor of surgery at Lund University and to spend more than 20 years as chief surgeon and hospital director (klinikchef) at Lund University Hospital. He also became a pioneer of extensive abdominal surgery.

After almost 30 years in surgery, Stig had gained tremendous insight into the human body and had begun to suspect that intestinal flora had greater importance in relation to health than previously supposed. It has been demonstrated, for example, that over 70% of the immune system is located in the intestinal flora! Stig had begun to pick up on a strange connection between diet, chronic inflammation and disease, which convinced him that our Western lifestyle could lead to so-called diseases of affluence. He thus decided to undertake research focussing on intestinal flora and accepted a visiting professorship at London University, where he became Professor Emeritus.

Alongside a few colleagues, and driven by the desire to bring improvement to people’s intestinal health, Stig started a further research project in 1999. The goal was to identify an ‘elite’ of beneficial intestinal bacteria that would mutually strengthen each other’s properties and have an additional anti-inflammatory effect. Over 500 different lactic acid bacteria were studied and the project resulted in four unique strains of lactic acid bacteria being selected and patented. These bacteria were combined with four types of dietary fibre that had been shown to help the bacteria multiply in the gut. Stig and his colleagues chose to name their composition of beneficial bacteria (probiotics) and dietary fibres (prebiotics) Synbiotic2000, a preparation that achieved good results in a number of studies in the following years.

After many years of clinical studies on Synbiotic2000, Stig felt so sure of its efficacy that he wanted to make the combination available to the public. He therefore started Super Synbiotics in 2016 as a way of making his synbiotics available to ordinary people. In 2018, he also published his first book, Choose Health!, featuring his collected advice and knowledge concerning an anti-inflammatory lifestyle. In the preface to the book, Professor Martin Schalling writes: Stig Bengmark ”was now not only a doctor, researcher and professor but also an entrepreneur, albeit with a social pathos. … In my opinion, he is one of the greatest social entrepreneurs, as the goal of radically influencing public health is a journey towards the finest goal we can have – a life with better health”.

Through his knowledge and research, and thanks to his passionate commitment to improving public health, Professor Stig Bengmark has succeeded in helping many people achieve a healthier life!