The Role of Fecal Microbiota Transplantation in the Treatment of Neurodegenerative Diseases: A Review

• Published in: International journal of molecular sciences Vol. 24; no. 2; p. 1001
• Main Authors: Matheson, Julie-Anne T, Holsinger, R M Damian
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 05.01.2023; MDPI
• Subjects: Age; Alzheimer's disease; Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis; Animal cognition; Antibiotics; Brain research; Case studies; Chemokines; Clostridium Infections - therapy; Cognitive ability; Cytokines; Digestive system; Dysbiosis - therapy; fecal microbiota transplant; Fecal Microbiota Transplantation; Fecal microflora; Feces; Gastrointestinal Microbiome; Health services; Humans; Intestinal microflora; Memory; Metabolism; Microbiomes; Microbiota; multiple sclerosis; neurodegenerative disease; Neurodegenerative Diseases - therapy; Neurological diseases; Parkinson's disease; Pathogenesis; Pathology; Probiotics; Review; Transplantation; Traumatic brain injury; gut microbiome; neurodegenerative disease; Alzheimer’s disease; fecal microbiota transplant; multiple sclerosis; amyotrophic lateral sclerosis; Parkinson’s disease
• ISSN: 1422-0067; 1661-6596; 1422-0067
• DOI: 10.3390/ijms24021001

Neurodegenerative diseases are highly prevalent but poorly understood, and with few treatment options despite decades of intense research, attention has recently shifted toward other mediators of neurological disease that may present future targets for therapeutic research. One such mediator is the gut microbiome, which communicates with the brain through the gut-brain axis and has been implicated in various neurological disorders. Alterations in the gut microbiome have been associated with numerous neurological and other diseases, and restoration of the dysbiotic gut has been shown to improve disease conditions. One method of restoring a dysbiotic gut is via fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT), recolonizing the "diseased" gut with normal microbiome. Fecal microbiota transplantation is a treatment method traditionally used for infections, but it has recently been used in neurodegenerative disease research as a potential treatment method. This review aims to present a summary of neurodegenerative research that has used FMT, whether as a treatment or to investigate how the microbiome influences pathogenesis.