Volatile organic compound profiling as a potential biomarker in irritable bowel syndrome: A feasibility study

• Published in: Frontiers in medicine Vol. 9; p. 960000
• Main Authors: Van Malderen, Kathleen, Hanning, Nikita, Lambrechts, Helen, Haverhals, Tine, Van Marcke, Silke, Ceuleers, Hannah, De Man, Joris G., De Winter, Benedicte Y., Lamote, Kevin, De Schepper, Heiko U.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Frontiers Media S.A 04.08.2022
• Subjects: IBS; ion mobility spectrometry; irritable bowel syndrome; Medicine; neurogastroenterology; VOC; volatile organic compounds
• ISSN: 2296-858X; 2296-858X
• DOI: 10.3389/fmed.2022.960000

Background Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a chronic gastrointestinal disorder for which no diagnostic tools are currently available. Patients are diagnosed using the Rome IV criteria and subtyped into a diarrhea, constipation, or mixed phenotype based on their dominant stool pattern. A recent development in the biomarker area is the analysis of volatile organic compounds (VOCs). The aim of this study was to evaluate the potential of VOCs as diagnostic and phenotypic biomarkers for IBS in breath and fecal samples. Materials and methods Breath and fecal samples from IBS patients and healthy asymptomatic controls (HC) were analyzed with multicapillary column/ion mobility spectrometry (MCC/IMS) and classification models were created based upon VOCs and clinical characteristics. Discussion Irritable bowel syndrome patients were differentiated from HC by means of volatile profiling in both breath and fecal samples with area under the curve (AUCs) of respectively 0.62 and 0.80. Patient subtypes could also be differentiated from each other with AUCs ranging between 0.65 and 0.78. Furthermore, VOC models could differentiate IBS patients based on clinical characteristics like psychological comorbidities and microbiota-influencing therapies. Conclusion This study is the first to demonstrate the use of VOC profiling with the help of MCC/IMS to differentiate IBS patients. Furthermore, the importance of clinical characteristics beside the dominant stool pattern in the differentiation of IBS patients was emphasized.