One product, one panel, one record.
Phillips' Colon Health Daily Probiotic Capsules, 4-in-1 Symptom Defense (60 count) — label audit
The US government's label database holds two currently-on-market Phillips' Colon Health records carrying entirely different organisms, from different continents, at different CFU levels — a Danish LGG/BB-12 formula and a Japanese KS-13/G9-1/MM-2 formula — and both wear the same "4-in-1 Symptom Defense" claim set on the same box front.
This page is an audit of a label. It records what this product’s panel discloses, what of that could be checked against a primary record, and what could not. The score below ranks this product on that disclosure and on nothing else.
The record this page rests on
- NIH label record
- Label read on
- The most recent dated artefact behind this page. Labels change; this is how old our reading of it is.
- Cohort
- Addendum — outside the founding denominators Torn down 2026-07-31, after the founding cohort of 27 was frozen. It sits outside every D27 denominator the site publishes.
- How deep this went
- Full forensic teardown Panel transcribed, every strain designator queried, every certification chased to its issuer’s own register, and the literature behind each marketing claim opened and read.
The Label Verifiability Score for this product
76.7 out of 100
Rank 39 of the 154 products in this audit the rubric can score. This rank is shared with 6 other products — 7 products sit on 76.7 and are tied. They hold the position jointly; no tiebreaker is applied, because every tiebreaker available here would be a number the rubric deliberately refused to weigh, smuggled back in to make a list look tidier.
The score measures one thing: how much of what you are buying this company tells you, and how much of that survives being checked against a source that is not the company. It does not measure whether the product works — this site holds no efficacy data of its own, and 0 of 294 organism slots in the founding cohort carry a strain with a human randomised trial for any male-specific outcome, so nobody in this category has evidence that would support a ranking by effect.
Computed over 86% of the rubric by weight — the share of the five questions below this record could answer. The remaining question is unanswered, and unanswered is not nought: it leaves the divisor rather than dragging the score down. That share travels with the number and is never dropped — this score over 86% of the weight and the same score over all of it are different claims.
| Component | Weight | What was counted, and where | Fraction | Weight × fraction |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Strain identity printed on the panel | 0.24 | 2 of 2 organism slots carry a printed strain designator. | 2 / 2 = 1.0000 | 0.2400 |
| Per-organism amount printed | 0.20 | 0 of 2 organism slots have an amount of its own; the rest are inside a blend total. | 0 / 2 = 0.0000 | 0.0000 |
| What the CFU count is measured against | 0.22 | Potency basis "both-endpoints": CFU figure printed yes, single basis stated yes, basis reaches expiry yes — 3 of 3. | 3 / 3 = 1.0000 | 0.2200 |
| Printed designators that lead to a human trial | 0.20 | 2 of 2 checked organism slots resolve to at least one human randomised trial under the designator exactly as printed. This counts whether the identity leads to a trial, never what the trial found. | 2 / 2 = 1.0000 | 0.2000 |
| Certification confirmed at the issuer’s own register | 0.14 | Every certification on this record is brand-asserted with the register unreachable, or not yet queried. An unreachable register is a fact about the verification infrastructure, not about this brand, so it may not move its position. | Not answered | — excluded from the divisor, not counted as nought |
0.6600 — the last column added up — divided by 0.86, the weight this record could answer, is 0.7674. Multiplied by 100 and rounded to one decimal, that is the 76.7 above.
See this product’s row in the full ranking, alongside the other 153 scored products, or read what each of the five components asks and how to check it .
What this label discloses
Everything in this table is what the product itself states — on the printed panel, on the brand’s own page, or in the label record the manufacturer filed. Nothing in it is checked yet; checking is the next section.
| Disclosure | As recorded |
|---|---|
| CFU as printed | 3 Billion CFUs |
| What that count is measured against | Both endpoints printed |
| Strain designators | All organisms coded |
| Organism slots transcribed here | 2 — the full panel |
| Marketed as | Unisex |
Panel footnote, verbatim: "# Contains 8.8 billion live bacteria/Colony Forming Units (CFUs) when manufactured and provides a level of probiotic of 3 billion CFUs at time of expiration." Both numbers, both labelled, and the figure on the front of the pack is the expiry number rather than the manufacture one — a roughly 66% decay allowance, disclosed. This is the most transparent CFU disclosure in its batch and one of the more honest anywhere in this project, and Bayer deserves full credit for it. It is independently confirmed by NIH's own transcription: DSLD 317577 records both the ingredient row ("Proprietary Blend | 3 billion CFUs") and the statement, word for word.
The panel’s own words on potency, verbatim.
The panel prints both a manufacture figure and an expiration figure, so the decline over shelf life is readable off the label itself.
Every organism on the panel carries a printed strain designator. Whether those designators lead anywhere is a separate question, answered below.
| Organism as printed | Designator as printed | Quantity as printed | What the designator resolves to | The query we ran |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lactobacillus rhamnosus (correct name: Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus) | LGG® | — not stated separately | Human RCT | "Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG"[All Fields] → 1451; "Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus GG"[All Fields] → 276; "ATCC 53103"[All Fields] → 170; ("Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG" OR "Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus GG" OR "ATCC 53103") AND randomized controlled trial[Publication Type] → 191; the same set AND "irritable bowel syndrome"[All Fields] AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 8; AND constipation[All Fields] AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 4; ("Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG" OR "Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus GG") AND (bloating OR flatulence) AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 3 |
| Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis | BB-12® | — not stated separately | Human RCT | "BB-12"[All Fields] AND Bifidobacterium[All Fields] → 396; "Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis BB-12"[All Fields] → 18; ("BB-12" OR "BB12") AND Bifidobacterium AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 141; the same AND constipation[All Fields] AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 6; AND (bloating OR flatulence) AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 4; ("Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG" OR "Lacticaseibacillus rhamnosus GG") AND ("BB-12" OR "BB12") AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 33 |
What of that is verifiable
A disclosure is verifiable when a reader can open a record that neither we nor the brand controls and see the same thing. Below is every dated artefact this page rests on. What is absent from this list is not verified, however reasonable it sounds.
- NIH Dietary Supplement Label Database record — DSLD 317577 (opens in a new tab) captured NIH label record for the exact SKU — 60 capsules, UPC 3 12843 54120 7, offMarket=0. Distributor of record Bayer HealthCare LLC, Whippany NJ; product of Denmark. It transcribes the ingredient row "Proprietary Blend | 3 billion CFUs" and the potency statement word for word: "Contains 8.8 billion live bacteria/Colony Forming Units (CFUs) when manufactured and provides a level of probiotic of 3 billion CFUs at time of expiration." It also carries the free-from claims "Dairy free - Gluten free / Soy free - Non-GMO" as plain formulation text with no certification mark in its Seals/Symbols statements. This record and the marketplace panel image agree exactly, which is the strongest verification available while the brand's own site refuses all automated access.
- Photograph of the printed panel — 81XZOXHaOqLhttps://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81XZOXHaOqL._AC_SL1500_.jpg — Address given, not linked: this site does not link out to the products it audits. captured The Supplement Facts image itself, recovered from the archived marketplace listing and transcribed verbatim. Serving size 1 capsule. "Proprietary Blend: 3 Billion CFUs# — †; Lactobacillus rhamnosus (LGG®), Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis (BB-12®); † Daily Value not established", with the panel note "LGG® and BB-12® are registered trademarks of Chr. Hansen A/S". Other ingredients: maltodextrin, hydroxypropyl methylcellulose, microcrystalline cellulose, sucrose; less than 2% of magnesium stearate, sodium ascorbate. Storage below 25 °C (77 °F), no refrigeration required.
- Internet Archive capture — 20251207223649 (opens in a new tab) captured The archive capture the panel image and the price were recovered through, and the source of the verbatim marketing copy — the 4-in-1 symptom list, the "Clinically well-studied strains" A+ image 81yNFrYceTL, the "About 70% of your immune system" line and the "over 150 years of digestive health expertise" claim. Live Amazon returns a CAPTCHA page to automation, so the price is of-date rather than current.
How many of its strains have a human trial for what it is sold for
Across the frozen founding cohort, 0 of 294 organism slots (0.0%) carry an organism with a human randomised controlled trial for any male-specific outcome. Not for this product — for all 27 of the founding teardowns, taken together. That is the number to hold against any men’s probiotic, including this one.
Two further founding-cohort figures for context: only 43 of 294 organism slots carry a strain with any human RCT at all under the exact code printed on the label, and only 2 of 27 products have a published human trial of the finished formula — the thing actually in the bottle. All three figures divide by the frozen cohort of 27 teardowns and 294 organism slots, never by every teardown on this site.
For this product specifically, 2 organism slots carry a strain with a human RCT under the exact designator printed on the label.
A word on what a designator has to clear before it counts here. The organism must be named with the exact strain code that appears in the trial, the trial must be in humans, and the code must return that trial when a reader searches it. A species name does not qualify: the trials in this field are of strains, and a species contains thousands of them.
What it costs per day
$0.36 a day at the dose the label itself instructs.
- Price
- $21.66 USD
- What that buys
- 60-capsule bottle at $0.36 a count; serving is 1 capsule daily with a meal, 60 servings per container ($21.66 ÷ 60 = $0.361). That works out at $0.12 per guaranteed billion CFU per day — the cheapest guaranteed CFU in its batch by a factor of six. The prior archived Amazon price was $17.99 ($0.30 a count) on 2024-01-08, and a reseller listed the identical 60-count SKU at $30.63 (was $33.67), so treat this as of-date rather than current.
- Price checked
- — the source we read it from (opens in a new tab)
What certification it holds, checked at the issuer’s own register
A badge on a bottle is a claim like any other. Every row below was checked — or not checked — at the certifier’s own public register, never at the badge. Across the frozen founding cohort, 2 of 27 products hold a certification we could confirm at the issuer — a founding-cohort figure, not a count over every teardown on this site.
| Programme | Status at the issuer | Checked |
|---|---|---|
| Non-GMO (plain label text, not the Non-GMO Project Verified mark) | Brand-asserted, unverified | 31 July 2026 |
Non-GMO (plain label text, not the Non-GMO Project Verified mark)
The badge is displayed, but the register could not be reached to confirm it. We call this unverified, not false.
The label's free-from claims read "Dairy free - Gluten free / Soy free - Non-GMO", recorded in DSLD 317577 under the statement type "Formulation re: Does NOT Contain". This is plain label text, not the Non-GMO Project butterfly: DSLD's Seals/Symbols statements for this record contain no certification mark at all. It is a self-assertion, and it is listed here so that it is not mistaken for a third-party programme. No NSF, no USP, no Informed Choice and no cGMP certifier is named on the label or on the archived product page, and no third-party mark is claimed for this product. The registers could not be queried in any case — usp.org 403, nsf.org 403, nongmoproject.org 404 — so no claim is made about whether Bayer holds any listing it does not advertise.
How it differs from the same brand’s women’s version
Across the fourteen same-brand men’s-versus-women’s label diffs run inside the frozen founding cohort, zero men’s or default formulas contain a probiotic strain, identified by designator, that was selected on male-specific evidence. In eight of the fourteen the sex-specific differentiator is a botanical or a mineral, and in five of the fourteen the women’s SKU is better-specified, cheaper, or both — “better-specified” meaning the panel that discloses more, never the panel with more in it. The rule behind each of those counts, and all fourteen pairs classified against it , are published in full. Diffs run on teardowns added since sit outside this fourteen, and outside the sentence above.
This brand sells no women’s counterpart to this product, so there is no diff to run.
Every finding on this page, with the record behind it
Finding 1 proprietary-blend-two-strains-one-number
3 billion CFUs across Lactobacillus rhamnosus LGG® and Bifidobacterium animalis subsp. lactis BB-12®, with no split. Neither strain can be checked against its own trial dose. Both strains are extensively studied at 10⁹ to 10¹⁰ CFU/day each, and a 3 × 10⁹ combined ceiling forces at least one of them below that range.
The record: Panel image 81XZOXHaOqL via Wayback 20251207223649, and DSLD 317577 ingredient row "Proprietary Blend | 3 billion CFUs", both read 2026-07-31 — open it (opens in a new tab)
Finding 2 two-different-formulas-ship-under-the-same-brand-and-claim-set
DSLD holds two currently-on-market Phillips' Colon Health records with entirely different organisms from different continents at different CFU levels — the 2024 Danish LGG/BB-12 records and the 2025-entered Japanese KS-13/G9-1/MM-2 record — sharing branding and sharing the "helps defend against occasional gas / bloating / constipation / diarrhoea" claim set. A live corroboration that old-formula stock is still on shelves: the Wegmans listing for Phillips' Colon Health Daily Probiotic 4-in-1 (SKU 130000, UPC 00312843534308) gives other ingredients as "Potato Starch, Gelatin, Silicon Dioxide" — the Japanese-formula excipients — under the same UPC that DSLD 317575 assigns to the Danish LGG/BB-12 formula.
The record: DSLD 317575, 317576, 317577 and 337415, all offMarket=0, read 2026-07-31; Wegmans listing SKU 130000, UPC 00312843534308, same day
Finding 3 clinically-well-studied-strains-cannot-be-mapped-to-this-products-doses
The A+ content states "Clinically well-studied strains: Lactobacillus rhamnosus (LGG®) · Bifidobacterium (BB-12®)". That is true of LGG and BB-12 as strains. It is doing work it has not earned as a statement about this product, because the blend hides whether either strain is present at a studied dose. Accurate about the ingredient, silent about the formulation.
The record: A+ image 81yNFrYceTL via Wayback 20251207223649, quoted verbatim, against the panel's single 3 billion CFU figure
Finding 4 seventy-percent-of-your-immune-system-carried-on-pack-uncited
"About 70% of your immune system is found in your intestines, including your colon" — a widely repeated figure printed on the pack with no citation of any kind.
The record: DSLD 317577 label statements and the archived Amazon PDP, both read 2026-07-31
Finding 5 one-hundred-fifty-year-heritage-transferred-from-a-laxative
"Backed by over 150 years of digestive health expertise". Phillips' Milk of Magnesia dates to the 1870s; this probiotic launched around 2008 and has been reformulated at least twice since, most recently across continents. The heritage attaches to a magnesium hydroxide laxative, not to these bacteria.
The record: Archived Amazon PDP copy, Wayback 20251207223649, quoted verbatim
Finding 6 the-brand-site-blocks-all-automated-access
phillipsdigestive.com returns HTTP 403 to every automated method, serving a bot-block interstitial that echoes the requesting IP. The only readable Supplement Facts for this product is a marketplace JPEG, recovered from an archive capture, plus NIH's text transcription. A consumer cannot read this panel as text on the brand's own site because they cannot reach the brand's own site.
The record: phillipsdigestive.com/products/colon-health-probiotic-caps/ → HTTP 403 to curl and WebFetch, 2026-07-31; Akamai /akam/ pixel paths in the Wayback index
Finding 7 the-legacy-formulas-trials-measured-allergy-and-immune-endpoints-at-twice-the-label-dose
The three-strain Japanese formula that still ships under this brand has published evidence that is not about the four claimed symptoms. PMID 25909149 (Spaiser SJ et al., J Am Coll Nutr 2015;34(6):459-69, n=32 older adults, crossover) measured CD4+ lymphocyte percentage, IL-10 and faecal microbiota, dosed twice daily, with no gas, bloating, constipation or diarrhoea endpoint. PMID 28228426 (Dennis-Wall JC et al., Am J Clin Nutr 2017;105(3):758-767, n=173) measured rhinoconjunctivitis quality of life during allergy season at "2 capsules/d, 1.5 billion colony-forming units/capsule" — 3 × 10⁹ a day — again with no GI symptom endpoint. So the legacy formula's own trials measured immune and allergy outcomes, not the four claimed digestive symptoms, and dosed twice what its label directs.
The record: PMIDs 25909149 and 28228426, read via NCBI E-utilities 2026-07-31; ("Lactobacillus gasseri KS-13" OR "Bifidobacterium bifidum G9-1" OR "Bifidobacterium longum MM-2") AND randomized controlled trial[pt] → 3 records (42017290, 28228426, 25909149)
What we could not verify
Every gap below is published rather than deleted. Most are derived automatically from the empty fields in this page’s own record, so a gap cannot be hidden by leaving a box blank.
- Non-GMO (plain label text, not the Non-GMO Project Verified mark) status
- The label's free-from claims read "Dairy free - Gluten free / Soy free - Non-GMO", recorded in DSLD 317577 under the statement type "Formulation re: Does NOT Contain". This is plain label text, not the Non-GMO Project butterfly: DSLD's Seals/Symbols statements for this record contain no certification mark at all. It is a self-assertion, and it is listed here so that it is not mistaken for a third-party programme. No NSF, no USP, no Informed Choice and no cGMP certifier is named on the label or on the archived product page, and no third-party mark is claimed for this product. The registers could not be queried in any case — usp.org 403, nsf.org 403, nongmoproject.org 404 — so no claim is made about whether Bayer holds any listing it does not advertise.
- How the 3 billion CFU splits between LGG and BB-12
- The panel gives one number for two organisms. There is no way to know whether this is 1.5 billion each, or 2.9 billion LGG and 0.1 billion BB-12. It matters because the pack claims four outcomes and the strains do have trials for those outcomes — but LGG and BB-12 trials commonly run at 10⁹ to 10¹⁰ CFU/day each, and a 3 × 10⁹ combined ceiling arithmetically forces at least one of them, and possibly both, below the range it was studied at.
- Which formula is actually inside a given box on a shelf
- NIH's label database holds two Phillips' Colon Health records that are both flagged on-market and that carry entirely different organisms: DSLD 317575/317576/317577 (2024, LGG® and BB-12®, product of Denmark, 8.8 billion at manufacture and 3 billion at expiry, excipients maltodextrin/HPMC/MCC/sucrose) and DSLD 337415 (entered 2025-08-22, the legacy trio L. gasseri KS-13, B. bifidum G9-1 and B. longum MM-2, made in Japan, 1.75 billion at manufacture and 1.5 billion at expiry, excipients potato starch/gelatin/silicon dioxide). Both carry the "4-in-1 Symptom Defense" positioning and the same occasional gas, bloating, constipation and diarrhoea claim set, and they are not distinguishable from the front of the box.
- Any RCT of the specific LGG plus BB-12 combination at 3 billion CFU/day against the four claimed symptoms
- None was found among the 33 records returned by the combination query — but that screen read titles and abstracts, not full texts. Record it as "not found in a title/abstract screen", not as a proven absence.
- Any certification register
- usp.org's verified-products listing returned HTTP 403, nsf.org's certified-products search returned HTTP 403, nongmoproject.org's product finder returned HTTP 404. No third-party mark is claimed on this product, so no specific claim is outstanding, and the absence of a listing was not proven either.
- Funding and conflict-of-interest statements for the LGG and BB-12 trial literature
- Not retrieved. No funding characterisation is published for that literature on this page.
- Anything from the brand's own website
- phillipsdigestive.com returns HTTP 403 to curl and to WebFetch — a hard bot block serving a "Site Maintenance / Your bot have been rated as a harmful activity" interstitial that echoes the requesting IP back, with Akamai /akam/ pixel paths visible in the Wayback index. Every label figure on this page therefore rests on NIH's transcription and on the Supplement Facts image from an archived marketplace listing. Those two agree exactly, which is the strongest verification available without the brand site.
How to check every line of this page yourself
Nothing on this page requires trusting us. Every claim above resolves to a record you can open:
- Open the NIH Dietary Supplement Label Database record linked at the top of this page. It is the label the manufacturer filed, not our transcription of it.
- Compare the CFU line and the suggested-use line against the disclosure table above. If they disagree with us, we are wrong and we want to know.
- Take any strain designator from the panel and run the query printed beside it. The query is published precisely so you can get a different answer than we did.
- Divide the price by the number of days the label’s own dose instructions make the container last. That arithmetic is the whole of the cost-per-day row.
- Search the certifier’s own register for this product, not for the brand. A company can participate in a programme without this product being on its list.
This product has the best strain disclosure and the most honest CFU statement in its batch, and it is still impossible to tell whether it works at this dose. Both facts are true at once, and holding them together is the whole exercise.
What Bayer gets right. The panel names two organisms by single-strain trademarks that map one-to-one to public accessions — LGG® is ATCC 53103, BB-12® is DSM 15954 — and names the trademark owner, Chr. Hansen. These are among the most heavily published probiotic strains in existence, with 191 RCT-tagged records for LGG and 141 for BB-12, including trials on the exact outcomes the pack claims. And the potency footnote is best practice: “Contains 8.8 billion live bacteria/Colony Forming Units (CFUs) when manufactured and provides a level of probiotic of 3 billion CFUs at time of expiration.” Both numbers. Both labelled. The number on the front of the box is the expiry figure, not the flattering one. At $0.12 per guaranteed billion CFU per day, it is also the cheapest guaranteed CFU in its batch by a factor of six.
What defeats all of it. The panel gives one number for two organisms. 3 billion CFUs, no split. There is no way to know whether that is 1.5 billion each or 2.9 billion of one and 0.1 billion of the other. LGG and BB-12 trials commonly dose 10⁹ to 10¹⁰ CFU/day each — so a 3 × 10⁹ combined ceiling arithmetically forces at least one of them, and possibly both, below the range it was studied at. The A+ content’s “Clinically well-studied strains” is accurate about the ingredients and silent about the formulation. That is the textbook transfer.
And then the finding that has nothing to do with dose. NIH’s label database holds two currently-on-market Phillips’ Colon Health records with entirely different organisms — the 2024 Danish LGG/BB-12 formula, and a 2025-entered record carrying the older Japanese trio L. gasseri KS-13, B. bifidum G9-1 and B. longum MM-2 at 1.5 billion CFU at expiry. Both are flagged on-market. Both wear “4-in-1 Symptom Defense”. A Wegmans listing gives the Japanese excipients — potato starch, gelatin, silicon dioxide — under the same UPC that NIH assigns to the Danish formula. From the front of the box, they are not distinguishable.
That matters clinically, not just editorially. The legacy trio’s own published trials measured CD4+ lymphocytes and allergy-season quality of life — not gas, bloating, constipation or diarrhoea — and dosed twice what the label directs.