Tag Archives: stomach

Novel device: ‘Surface mapping’ a reliable diagnostic tool for gut health

Posted on by
Reply

Non-invasive sensors laid on the skin’s surface to measure bioelectrical activity could offer a better alternative for patients suffering with poor gut health.

Stefan Calder, a recent PhD graduate at the Auckland Bioengineering Institute (ABI), at Waipapa Taumata Rau, University of Auckland is the lead and joint-first author for two papers published in prestigious scientific journals this month on gut health. Stefan says gastric disorders are increasingly prevalent in humans, but reliable non-invasive tools to objectively assess gastric function are lacking.

“Many people suffering with chronic gut issues are on a constant diagnostic treadmill of antibiotics or proton pump inhibitors until they are sent for an endoscopy. A reliable surface-based recording could bridge the gap between symptom-based diagnostics and the more invasive minor surgery tests.”

Like the rhythmic beatings of the heart, gut movements depend on bioelectrical activity – but the electrical activity in the gut has been much more difficult to reliably detect. Researchers at ABI and the Faculty of Medical and Health Sciences’ Department of Surgery have employed a novel device using a sticky patch of sensors and a recording device and associated techniques to create a new and reliable non-invasive tool to map electrical waves from the stomach.

healthcare

Coined “Body Surface Gastric Mapping” (BSGM), the method has proven a reliable detector of gastric slow wave activity and has now led to an exciting and unexpected discovery identifying two distinct disease subgroups in chronic nausea and vomiting syndromes.

BSGM has shown to reliably record bio-electrical activity on the gut’s surface and accurately detect changes in both the frequency or rhythm, and direction of electromagnetic waves with intricate detail.

The degree of difference in bio-electrical activity between healthy people and patients with chronic nausea and vomiting syndromes defined by the novel gastric mapping device was set to explore. While previous surgical and non-invasive studies have shown that gastric dysfunctions are associated with abnormal bio-electrical slow waves, the researchers found surprising results.

“Approximately two-thirds of the symptomatic patient group had completely normal bio-electrical activity, while the rest had abnormal activity. We realised there were two sub types of what was previously considered a single disease.

“This may go on to explain or further classify that single disease into two diseases based on different mechanisms. For example, abnormal bioelectrical activity is likely to point to something intrinsically wrong with the stomach itself, but for those patients who show a completely normal slow wave propagation, their issue is likely arising from somewhere else.

“This idea of recording electrical activity on the body’s surface has been around for a long time. ECG machines, recording electrical activity have gained diagnostic acceptance for the last 100 years, but in the gut that is not the case. Through these studies we have validated a device and process that can reliably and accurately evidence bioelectrical activity in the stomach. We also show that bioactivity in the stomach can be a useful biological marker for disease.

“With this bio-electrical information on hand to inform clinical guidance or treatment, people experiencing chronic vomiting or nausea may be directed to different pathways and may receive diagnosis and more appropriate treatment options sooner.”

 

Exposure to air pollution in infancy alters gut microorganisms, may boost disease risk [Preventive Steps]

Posted on by
Reply

Exposure to air pollution in the first six months of life impacts a child’s inner world of gut bacteria, or microbiome, in ways that could increase risk of allergies, obesity and diabetes, and even influence brain development, suggests new CU Boulder research.

“This study adds to the growing body of literature showing that air pollution exposure, even during infancy, may alter the gut microbiome, with important implications for growth and development,” said senior author Tanya Alderete, assistant professor of Integrative Physiology at CU Boulder.

At birth, an infant hosts little resident bacteria. Over the first two to three years of life, exposure to mother’s milk, solid food, antibiotics and other environmental influences shape which microorganisms take hold. Those microbes, and the metabolites, or byproducts, they produce when they break down food or chemicals in the gut, influence a host of bodily systems that shape appetite, insulin sensitivity, immunity, mood and cognition. While many are beneficial, some microbiome compositions have been associated with Chrohn’s disease, asthma, type 2 diabetes, and other chronic illnesses.

Air pollution/photo:en.wikipedia.org

“The microbiome plays a role in nearly every physiological process in the body, and the environment that develops in those first few years of life sticks with you,” said first author Maximilian Bailey, who graduated in May with a master’s in Integrative Physiology and is now a medical student at Stanford University.

Boosting inflammation

For the study, the researchers obtained fecal samples from 103 healthy, primarily breast-fed Latino infants enrolled in the Southern California Mother’s Milk Study and used genetic sequencing to analyze them.

Using their street addresses and data from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Air Quality System, which records hourly data from monitoring systems, they estimated exposure to PM2.5 and PM10 (fine inhalable particles from things like factories, wildfires and construction sites) and Nitrogen Dioxide (NO2), a gas largely emitted from cars.

“Overall, we saw that ambient air pollution exposure was associated with a more inflammatory gut-microbial profile, which may contribute to a whole host of future adverse health outcomes,” said Alderete.

For instance, infants with the highest exposure to PM2.5 had 60% less Phascolarctobacterium, a beneficial bacterium known to decrease inflammation, support gastrointestinal health and aid in neurodevelopment. Those with the highest exposure to PM10 had 85% more of the microorganism Dialister, which is associated with inflammation.

infant-small child/photo:en.wikipedia.org

Infants are particularly vulnerable to the health hazards of air pollution because they breathe faster and their gut microbiome is just taking shape.

“This makes early life a critical window where exposure to air pollution may have disproportionately deleterious health effects,” they write.

Meantime, Alderete advises everyone to take these steps to reduce their exposure to both indoor and outdoor pollutants:

  • Avoid walking outdoors in high-traffic zones
  • Consider a low-cost air-filtration system, particularly for rooms children spend a lot of time in
  • If you are cooking, open the windows
  • And for new moms, breastfeed for as long as possible

“Breast milk is a fantastic way to develop a healthy microbiome and may help offset some of the adverse effects from environmental exposures,” Alderete said.