Children who grow up with dogs or in extended families may have a lower risk of Crohn’s disease later, a study has found. Cat cats did not have this effect.
Crohn’s disease is a chronic inflammatory bowel disease that can occur anywhere throughout the digestive tract, and the most common symptoms include diarrhea, abdominal pain, and weight loss.
Dr. Williams Turpin’s team at Mount Sinai Hospital in Canada and the University of Toronto used an environmental questionnaire to take medications for immediate family members (parents, siblings, children) of Crohn’s disease patients enrolled in the CCC-GEM (Crohn’s and Colitis Canada Genetic, Environmental, and Microbial) project. Information was collected from 4,300 people.
Using responses to the survey and historical data collected at the time of recruitment, the researchers studied several environmental factors, including family size, whether dogs or cats lived together, the number of toilets in the home, whether they lived on a farm, and whether they drank unpasteurized milk or well water. analyzed. The age at the time of exposure was also analyzed.
The results showed that children, especially those who lived with dogs between the ages of 5 and 15, were healthier in terms of gut permeability and had a better balance between the gut microbiome and the body’s immune response. These are all things that can help prevent Crohn’s disease. These effects were seen across all age groups.
The same results were not found with cats, but Dr. Turpin said, “Potential reasons may be that dog owners are more likely to go out with their pets and are more likely to live in green areas.”
Living with three or more family members in the first year of life also appeared to be helpful, which was later related to microbiome makeup. The gut microbiome is known to affect various health conditions such as inflammatory bowel disease, colorectal cancer, diabetes, and high blood pressure.
“The results of this study appear to be consistent with other studies that explored the ‘hygiene hypothesis’ that a lack of exposure to microbes in childhood can lead to a lack of immune regulation to environmental microbes,” said Dr. Turpin. .
Hygiene hypothesis is that if you are not exposed to infectious agents, intestinal bacteria, symbiotic microorganisms such as probiotics, and parasites in early infancy, the normal development of the immune system does not occur and the possibility of developing allergic diseases increases.
The results of this study were presented at the American Society of Gastroenterology, Digestive Disease Week 2022.
Reporter Jeong Hee-eun [email protected]
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