Common drugs affect our gut microbiome differently, with good and bad
impacts on health

Date:
December 9, 2021
Source:
University of Copenhagen - The Faculty of Health and Medical
Sciences
Summary:
Gut bacteria are both positively and negatively influenced by common
medicines, new research shows. Medications that lower cholesterol
and blood pressure are associated with a healthier composition
and function of gut bacteria, while gastric acid inhibitors and
antibiotics interfere with health-promoting bacterial communities.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Inside the gut live billions of health-promoting bacteria, collectively
called the gut microbiome. They act like a giant chemical factory that
produce a wealth of different substances that pass through the intestinal
wall, enter into the blood circulation and from there affect the body's
cells in different ways.


==========================================================================
Now a European research team consisting of scientists from France, Germany
and Denmark has shown the different ways that common medicines apparently affect gut bacteria. The work is published in the journal Nature.

"It has already been substantiated in various clinical trials that
different kinds of food can both positively and negatively regulate the
gut's 'chemical factory'. We have now taken the next step and investigated
the relationship of 20 different kinds of ordinary medicine with the
abundance and function of intestinal bacteria and their connection to
the severity of chronic diseases, such as heart disease, obesity and
type 2 diabetes," says Professor Oluf Pedersen from the Novo Nordisk
Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research (CBMR) at the University
of Copenhagen. He is the leader of the Danish team of researchers involved
in the European research project.

Several surprising findings Among the surprising discoveries was
evidence that a combination of two commonly used drugs -- diuretic
tablets (so-called loop diuretics) and blood pressure medication
(so-called beta-blockers) -- are associated with increased levels of health-promoting bacteria belonging to the bacterial genus Roseburia.

This type of bacterium is able to break down dietary fiber in plant foods
and convert them into butyric acid, whose health benefits include lowering inflammation and regulation of the epigenome. That is the dynamic part
of our DNA.



========================================================================== People with cardiovascular disease were also more likely to harbor a
healthier combination of various gut bacteria if they were also prescribed statins, a common class of drugs that lowers the level of harmful LDL cholesterol in the blood. A particularly interesting finding was that
the combination of statins and heart magnyl was associated with lower
levels of harmful fats in the blood.

On the other hand, the scientists also discovered that gastric acid
medication, so-called proton pump inhibitors, are linked to adverse
changes in the intestinal microbiome.

"In the colon of people who take gastric acid medication, we found
relatively high levels of bacteria that are normally only present in
the oral cavity.

Stomach acid usually kills bacteria from the oral cavity that try to
escape to the gut where they do not belong. But this is not the case
when you use these gastric acid inhibitors. The observation we have
made is important because the presence of oral bacteria in the colon
is associated with an increased risk of developing some types of colon
cancer," says Professor Oluf Pedersen.

Less diverse gut bacteria is linked to the consumption of antibiotics Not unexpectedly, the researchers found that repeated antibiotic treatments
over the past five to ten years is associated with a less diverse gut microbiome. Healthy people tend to have a diverse gut microbiome, whereas
the microbiome of people who live with chronic diseases such as obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease, tends to be less diverse. This lack
of diversity may reduce the capacity of the gut's 'chemical factory'
to produce health- promoting molecules.

The research project MetaCardis (Metagenomics in Cardiometabolic Diseases) started in 2012 with a EUR20 million grant from the EU and European
research centers and involved 2173 trial participants in Denmark,
Germany and France.

Trial participants were either healthy or had common chronic diseases
such as atherosclerosis of the heart, type 2 diabetes or obesity.

The researchers behind the MetaCardis project stress that they have
only discovered associations between the consumption of common drugs and changes to the gut microbiome. These results do not indicate any causal relationships, which is why future clinical interventions are needed
on humans and animals to explore any potential mechanistic causal
relationships between drug intake, gut microbiome and incidence of
chronic diseases.

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Copenhagen_-_The_Faculty_of_Health_and
Medical_Sciences. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Sofia K. Forslund, Rima Chakaroun, Maria Zimmermann-Kogadeeva, Lajos
Marko', Judith Aron-Wisnewsky, Trine Nielsen, Lucas Moitinho-Silva,
Thomas S. B. Schmidt, Gwen Falony, Sara Vieira-Silva, Solia
Adriouch, Renato J. Alves, Karen Assmann, Jean-Philippe Bastard,
Till Birkner, Robert Caesar, Julien Chilloux, Luis Pedro Coelho,
Leopold Fezeu, Nathalie Galleron, Gerard Helft, Richard Isnard,
Boyang Ji, Michael Kuhn, Emmanuelle Le Chatelier, Antonis Myridakis,
Lisa Olsson, Nicolas Pons, Edi Prifti, Benoit Quinquis, Hugo
Roume, Joe-Elie Salem, Nataliya Sokolovska, Valentina Tremaroli,
Mireia Valles-Colomer, Christian Lewinter, Nadja B. So/ndertoft,
Helle Krogh Pedersen, Tue H. Hansen, Chloe Amouyal, Ehm Astrid
Andersson Galijatovic, Fabrizio Andreelli, Olivier Barthelemy,
Jean-Paul Batisse, Eugeni Belda, Magalie Berland, Randa Bittar,
Herve' Blottie`re, Frederic Bosquet, Rachid Boubrit, Olivier
Bourron, Mickael Camus, Dominique Cassuto, Cecile Ciangura, Jean-
Philippe Collet, Maria-Carlota Dao, Morad Djebbar, Ange'lique
Dore', Line Engelbrechtsen, Soraya Fellahi, Sebastien Fromentin,
Pilar Galan, Dominique Gauguier, Philippe Giral, Agnes Hartemann,
Bolette Hartmann, Jens Juul Holst, Malene Hornbak, Lesley Hoyles,
Jean-Sebastien Hulot, Sophie Jaqueminet, Niklas Rye Jo/rgensen,
Hanna Julienne, Johanne Justesen, Judith Kammer, Nikolaj
Krarup, Mathieu Kerneis, Jean Khemis, Ruby Kozlowski, Ve'ronique
Lejard, Florence Levenez, Lea Lucas-Martini, Robin Massey, Laura
Martinez-Gili, Nicolas Maziers, Jonathan Medina- Stamminger, Gilles
Montalescot, Sandrine Moute, Ana Luisa Neves, Michael Olanipekun,
Laetitia Pasero Le Pavin, Christine Poitou, Francoise Pousset,
Laurence Pouzoulet, Andrea Rodriguez-Martinez, Christine Rouault,
Johanne Silvain, Mathilde Svendstrup, Timothy Swartz, Thierry
Vanduyvenboden, Camille Vatier, Stefanie Walther, Jens Peter Go/tze,
Lars Ko/ber, Henrik Vestergaard, Torben Hansen, Jean-Daniel Zucker,
Serge Hercberg, Jean-Michel Oppert, Ivica Letunic, Jens Nielsen,
Fredrik Ba"ckhed, S. Dusko Ehrlich, Marc-Emmanuel Dumas, Jeroen
Raes, Oluf Pedersen, Karine Cle'ment, Michael Stumvoll, Peer
Bork. Combinatorial, additive and dose-dependent drug-microbiome
associations. Nature, 2021; DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-04177-9 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/12/211209142537.htm

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