Wall Street Journal Best Seller Dr. M's Seven-X Plan for Digestive Health
Gastrointestinal illness is common in patients with autism and related disorders although some literature has disputed this.
Study
Dr. Kim and colleagues from the School of Medicine and Center for Neuroscience Research, SMART Institute of Advanced Biomedical Sciences, Korea wished to study if there are structure abnormalities in the gut associated with autism. They reported their findings in the journal Toxicology Research.
Methods of autism-gut study
- The study was conducted in a rat animal model of autism. Use of valproic acid during pregnancy is a risk factor for in human autism. In fact, autism like behavior can be induced in rats exposed to valproate during fetal life.
- On embryonic day 12, pregnant rats were injected with valproic acid or control solution without valproic acid.
- The gut of the resulting rat babies was analyzed at age 4 weeks.
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Results autism-gut study
Multiple structure and functional abnormalities were found in valproic acid treated animals as compared to controls.
- The gut was slow. This is consistent with frequent finding of constipation in human autism.
- There was thinning of the stomach and terminal small intestinal wall consistent with the leaky gut hypothesis in autism.
- There were fewer absorptive cells in small intestine which is consistent with reports of digestive problems encountered in autism.
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Conclusions of autism-gut study
Rat model of autism is associated with structural and functional gastrointestinal changes consistent with clinical manifestations in humans.
Dr. Minocha’s comments
The results of this study lend further add to the scientific evidence of GI involvement in autism and the gut-brain axis. The fact that such changes can be seen in early life suggests that these are part of and not the result of autism disorder. Gut-focused therapy is of paramount importance in autism.
Wall Street Journal Best Seller Dr. M's Seven-X Plan for Digestive Health
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