The Comparison of Gut Microbiota Between Different Types of Epilepsy in Children

Overview

Journal Microb Cell Fact

Publisher Biomed Central

Specialties Biotechnology
Microbiology

Date 2025 Mar 14

PMID 40082906

Authors

Siwei Fang

Nanfei Hu

Changci Zhou

Jiajia You

Liwen Wu

Xiongfeng Pan

Zhenghui Xiao

Jun Qiu

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Objective: To better understand the variations in gut microbiota in children with different types of epilepsy.

Methods: Thirty-seven children with epilepsy were included in the case group, which was further divided into focal (group A, n = 28) and generalized epilepsy groups (group B, n = 9) based on the origin and extent of the seizures. The focal epilepsy group was subdivided into the benign childhood epilepsy with centrotemporal spikes (BECT) (group C, n = 9) and non-BECT groups (group D, n = 19) based on the appearance of typical centrotemporal spikes or spike-wave complexes on the electroencephalogram (EEG). Additionally, 14 healthy children were selected as the control group (group E, n = 14).

Results: Significant differences were observed in the diversity and composition of gut microbiota between the case and control groups. At the genus level, the abundance of Megamonas (P = 0.001), Streptococcus (P<0.001), Romboutsia (P = 0.001), Bacteroides (P<0.05), and Escherichia/Shigella (P<0.05) was significantly higher in the focal epilepsy group than in the control group (0.027 vs. 0.00009, P = 0.001; 0.016 vs. 0.002, P<0.001; 0.013 vs. 0.002, P = 0.001; 0.030 vs. 0.002, P<0.05, respectively). Additionally, Escherichia/Shigella (P<0.05) was more abundant in the case group compared to the control group (0.033 vs. 0.002, P<0.05). Bacteroides (P<0.05) was more abundant in the control group than in the case group. Megamonas (P<0.001) and Collinsella (P<0.05) were significantly more prevalent in the BECT group than in the control group (0.034 vs. 0.00009, P<0.001; 0.014 vs. 0.001, P<0.05, respectively). In the non-BECT group, compared to the control group, Megamonas (P = 0.013), Streptococcus (P<0.001), Romboutsia (P = 0.001), and Escherichia/Shigella (P<0.05) were found in greater abundance (0.023 vs. 0.00009, P = 0.013; 0.018 vs. 0.002, P<0.001; 0.014 vs. 0.002, P = 0.001; 0.037 vs. 0.002, P<0.05, respectively).

Conclusions: Though, there were no statistically significant differences in gut microbiota between the different types of epilepsy, the gut microbiota of children with epilepsy significantly differed from that of healthy controls. The increased abundance of Escherichia/Shigella may lead to the worsening of clinical phenotypes and poor prognosis, and it could be a candidate biomarker to identify the focal epilepsy or even non-benign childhood epilepsy with centrotemporal spikes, potentially providing new therapeutic targets for the future.

References

Camfield C, Camfield P, Gordon K, Wirrell E, Dooley J . Incidence of epilepsy in childhood and adolescence: a population-based study in Nova Scotia from 1977 to 1985. Epilepsia. 1996; 37(1):19-23. DOI: 10.1111/j.1528-1157.1996.tb00506.x. View

Camfield P, Camfield C . Incidence, prevalence and aetiology of seizures and epilepsy in children. Epileptic Disord. 2015; 17(2):117-23. DOI: 10.1684/epd.2015.0736. View

Mungala-Odera V, White S, Meehan R, Otieno G, Njuguna P, Mturi N . Prevalence, incidence and risk factors of epilepsy in older children in rural Kenya. Seizure. 2008; 17(5):396-404. PMC: 3428880. DOI: 10.1016/j.seizure.2007.11.028. View

Fang M, Xi Z, Wu Y, Wang X . A new hypothesis of drug refractory epilepsy: neural network hypothesis. Med Hypotheses. 2011; 76(6):871-6. DOI: 10.1016/j.mehy.2011.02.039. View

Tang F, Hartz A, Bauer B . Drug-Resistant Epilepsy: Multiple Hypotheses, Few Answers. Front Neurol. 2017; 8:301. PMC: 5498483. DOI: 10.3389/fneur.2017.00301. View

Dahlin M, Prast-Nielsen S . The gut microbiome and epilepsy. EBioMedicine. 2019; 44:741-746. PMC: 6604367. DOI: 10.1016/j.ebiom.2019.05.024. View

Sampson T, Debelius J, Thron T, Janssen S, Shastri G, Ilhan Z . Gut Microbiota Regulate Motor Deficits and Neuroinflammation in a Model of Parkinson's Disease. Cell. 2016; 167(6):1469-1480.e12. PMC: 5718049. DOI: 10.1016/j.cell.2016.11.018. View

Jiang C, Li G, Huang P, Liu Z, Zhao B . The Gut Microbiota and Alzheimer's Disease. J Alzheimers Dis. 2017; 58(1):1-15. DOI: 10.3233/JAD-161141. View

Ding M, Lang Y, Shu H, Shao J, Cui L . Microbiota-Gut-Brain Axis and Epilepsy: A Review on Mechanisms and Potential Therapeutics. Front Immunol. 2021; 12:742449. PMC: 8542678. DOI: 10.3389/fimmu.2021.742449. View

10.

De Caro C, Leo A, Nesci V, Ghelardini C, Di Cesare Mannelli L, Striano P . Intestinal inflammation increases convulsant activity and reduces antiepileptic drug efficacy in a mouse model of epilepsy. Sci Rep. 2019; 9(1):13983. PMC: 6764994. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-019-50542-0. View

11.

Xie G, Zhou Q, Qiu C, Dai W, Wang H, Li Y . Ketogenic diet poses a significant effect on imbalanced gut microbiota in infants with refractory epilepsy. World J Gastroenterol. 2017; 23(33):6164-6171. PMC: 5597508. DOI: 10.3748/wjg.v23.i33.6164. View

12.

Fisher R, Cross J, French J, Higurashi N, Hirsch E, Jansen F . Operational classification of seizure types by the International League Against Epilepsy: Position Paper of the ILAE Commission for Classification and Terminology. Epilepsia. 2017; 58(4):522-530. DOI: 10.1111/epi.13670. View

13.

Zhou C, Gong S, Xiang S, Liang L, Hu X, Huang R . Changes and significance of gut microbiota in children with focal epilepsy before and after treatment. Front Cell Infect Microbiol. 2022; 12:965471. PMC: 9671114. DOI: 10.3389/fcimb.2022.965471. View

14.

Xiong J, Liu Y, Lin X, Zhang H, Zeng J, Hou J . Geographic distance and pH drive bacterial distribution in alkaline lake sediments across Tibetan Plateau. Environ Microbiol. 2012; 14(9):2457-66. PMC: 3477592. DOI: 10.1111/j.1462-2920.2012.02799.x. View

15.

Bolyen E, Rideout J, Dillon M, Bokulich N, Abnet C, Al-Ghalith G . Reproducible, interactive, scalable and extensible microbiome data science using QIIME 2. Nat Biotechnol. 2019; 37(8):852-857. PMC: 7015180. DOI: 10.1038/s41587-019-0209-9. View

16.

Callahan B, McMurdie P, Rosen M, Han A, Johnson A, Holmes S . DADA2: High-resolution sample inference from Illumina amplicon data. Nat Methods. 2016; 13(7):581-3. PMC: 4927377. DOI: 10.1038/nmeth.3869. View

17.

Segata N, Izard J, Waldron L, Gevers D, Miropolsky L, Garrett W . Metagenomic biomarker discovery and explanation. Genome Biol. 2011; 12(6):R60. PMC: 3218848. DOI: 10.1186/gb-2011-12-6-r60. View

18.

Peng A, Qiu X, Lai W, Li W, Zhang L, Zhu X . Altered composition of the gut microbiome in patients with drug-resistant epilepsy. Epilepsy Res. 2018; 147:102-107. DOI: 10.1016/j.eplepsyres.2018.09.013. View

19.

Carlson A, Xia K, Azcarate-Peril M, Goldman B, Ahn M, Styner M . Infant Gut Microbiome Associated With Cognitive Development. Biol Psychiatry. 2017; 83(2):148-159. PMC: 5724966. DOI: 10.1016/j.biopsych.2017.06.021. View

20.

De la Fuente M, Franchi L, Araya D, Diaz-Jimenez D, Olivares M, Alvarez-Lobos M . Escherichia coli isolates from inflammatory bowel diseases patients survive in macrophages and activate NLRP3 inflammasome. Int J Med Microbiol. 2014; 304(3-4):384-92. PMC: 4075040. DOI: 10.1016/j.ijmm.2014.01.002. View