Newswise — COLUMBUS, Ohio – Chemotherapy is known to cause behavioral side effects, including cognitive decline. Notably, the gut microbiome communicates with the brain to affect behavior, including cognition. “For the first time ever, our Intelligut Study found that the gut microbiome has been implicated in cognitive side effects of chemotherapy in humans,” said senior author Leah Pyter , associate professor of psychiatry and neuroscience with The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center and College of Medicine .
“The potential connection between the gut and the brain would allow us to create treatments for the gut to treat the brain.” Study findings are published in the journal Brain, Behavior, and Immunity. This clinical longitudinal observational study explored whether chemotherapy-induced disruption of the gut microbiome relates to cognitive decline and circulating inflammatory signals.
Fecal samples, blood and cognitive measures were collected from 77 patients with breast cancer before, during and after chemotherapy. Research highlights Chemotherapy induces microbiome disruption and inflammation. The resulting microbiome disruption relates to cognitive decline and inflammation.
Those cognitively impaired have unique chemotherapy-induced microbiome alterations. “We found that patients treated with chemotherapy who showed decreases in cognitive performance also had reductions in the diversity of their gut microbiome,” said Pyter, also a researcher with .
