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O’Mahony L, O’Shea E, O’Connor EM, Tierney A, Harkin M, Harrington J, Kennelly S, Arendt E, O’Toole PW, Timmons S. Older adults and healthcare professionals have limited awareness of the link between the Mediterranean diet and the gut microbiome for healthy aging. Front Nutr 2023; 10:1104238. [PMID: 36776602 PMCID: PMC9911522 DOI: 10.3389/fnut.2023.1104238] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/21/2022] [Accepted: 01/09/2023] [Indexed: 01/28/2023] Open
Abstract
Objectives Strategies to improve the gut microbiome through consuming an improved diet, including adopting the Mediterranean Diet (MD), may promote healthy aging. We explored older adults' and healthcare professionals' (HCPs) perspectives of the MD, gut health, and microbiome for their role in healthy aging. Design Phenomenological qualitative. Setting Community-dwelling older adults and HCPs in primary and secondary care in Ireland. Participants Older adults (aged 55 + years), recruited through social, retirement and disease-support groups. HCPs recruited through researcher networks and professional associations. Measurements Semi-structured 1:1 interviews and focus groups (FGs) conducted remotely with older adults and HCPs separately. Interviews/FGs were recorded, transcribed, and coded using inductive thematic analysis. Results Forty-seven older adults were recruited (50% male; 49% aged 60-69 years; 28% 70 +), and 26 HCPs including dietitians (n = 8); geriatricians (n = 6); clinical therapists (n = 4); nurses, pharmacists, catering managers, and meal-delivery service coordinators (n = 2 each). Older adults considered the MD "a nice way to enjoy food," good for cardiovascular health and longevity, but with accessibility and acceptability challenges (increased salads/fish, different food environments, socio-cultural differences). HCPs felt the MD is included in healthy eating advice, but not overtly, mostly through the promotion of mixed-fiber intake. Older adults considered "live" yogurt and probiotics, and to a lesser extent fiber, to maintain a "healthy gut," suggesting the gut has "something to do with" cognitive and digestive health. Overall, microbiota-health effects were considered "not common knowledge" among most older adults, but becoming more topical among both professionals and the public with advancing scientific communication. Conclusion While "gut health" was considered important, specific effects of the MD on gut microbiota, and the significance of this for healthy aging, was under-recognized. Future efforts should explain the importance to older adults of maintaining the gut microbiota through diet, while appreciating perspectives of probiotic products and supplements.
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Affiliation(s)
- Lauren O’Mahony
- Centre for Gerontology and Rehabilitation, School of Medicine, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | - Emma O’Shea
- Centre for Gerontology and Rehabilitation, School of Medicine, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | - Eibhlís M. O’Connor
- Department of Biological Sciences, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland,Health Research Institute, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland,APC Microbiome Ireland, Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | - Audrey Tierney
- School of Allied Health, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland,Health Implementation Science and Technology Research Cluster, Health Research Institute, University of Limerick, Limerick, Ireland
| | | | | | - Sharon Kennelly
- National Primary Care Strategy and Planning, Health Service Executive, Dublin, Ireland
| | - Elke Arendt
- School of Food and Nutritional Sciences, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | - Paul W. O’Toole
- APC Microbiome Ireland, Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland,School of Microbiology, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland
| | - Suzanne Timmons
- Centre for Gerontology and Rehabilitation, School of Medicine, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland,APC Microbiome Ireland, Alimentary Pharmabiotic Centre, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland,*Correspondence: Suzanne Timmons,
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Formosinho J, Bencard A, Whiteley L. Environmentality in biomedicine: microbiome research and the perspectival body. STUDIES IN HISTORY AND PHILOSOPHY OF SCIENCE 2022; 91:148-158. [PMID: 34922182 DOI: 10.1016/j.shpsa.2021.11.005] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 03/02/2021] [Revised: 10/18/2021] [Accepted: 11/07/2021] [Indexed: 06/14/2023]
Abstract
Microbiome research shows that human health is foundationally intertwined with the ecology of microbial communities living on and in our bodies. This challenges the categorical separation of organisms from environments that has been central to biomedicine, and questions the boundaries between them. Biomedicine is left with an empirical problem: how to understand causal pathways between host health, microbiota and environment? We propose a conceptual tool - environmentality - to think through this problem. Environmentality is the state or quality of being an environment for something else in a particular context: a fully perspectival proposition. Its power lies partly in what Isabelle Stengers has called the efficacy of the word itself, contrasting the dominant sense of the word environment as something both external and fixed. Through three case studies, we argue that environmentality can help think about the causality of microbiota vis-a-vis host health in a processual, relational and situated manner, across scales and temporalities. We situate this intervention within historical trajectories of thought in biomedicine, focusing on the challenge microbiome research poses to an aperspectival body. We argue that addressing entanglements between microbial and human lives requires that the environment is brought into the clinic, thus shortening the conceptual gap between medicine and public health.
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Affiliation(s)
- Joana Formosinho
- Medical Museion, Department of Public Health and Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research (CBMR), University of Copenhagen, Denmark.
| | - Adam Bencard
- Medical Museion, Department of Public Health and Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research (CBMR), University of Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Louise Whiteley
- Medical Museion, Department of Public Health and Novo Nordisk Foundation Center for Basic Metabolic Research (CBMR), University of Copenhagen, Denmark
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Avalueva EB, Serkova MY, Sitkin SI. <i>Helicobacter pylori</i>. The survival strategy of a commensal symbiont in the <i>Homo sapiens</i> population. EXPERIMENTAL AND CLINICAL GASTROENTEROLOGY 2021:102-108. [DOI: 10.31146/1682-8658-ecg-193-9-102-108] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 09/26/2023]
Abstract
Несмотря на крайне высокую степень инфицированности Helicobacter pylori в популяции Homo sapiens, подавляющее большинство инфицированных являются бессимптомными носителями. Широкое распространение инфекции H. pylori среди лиц без признаков патологии и низкая заболеваемость при хронической колонизации слизистой оболочки желудка указывают на то, что H. pylori с большей вероятностью является условно-патогенным микроорганизмом или патобионтом. Популяционная ликвидация инфекции H. pylori существенно снизила заболеваемость инфекцией H. pylori, однако появление устойчивости к противомикробным препаратам привело к их неэффективности.
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Affiliation(s)
- E. B. Avalueva
- North-Western state medical University named after I. I. Mechnikov, Ministry of health of the Russian Federation
| | - M. Yu. Serkova
- North-Western state medical University named after I. I. Mechnikov, Ministry of health of the Russian Federation
| | - S. I. Sitkin
- North-Western state medical University named after I. I. Mechnikov, Ministry of health of the Russian Federation; Almazov National Medical Research Centre
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