In recent years, there has been a notable rise in the instance of inflammatory bowel disease with many patients suffering severe, and frequently debilitating, chronic gastrointestinal symptoms.
Thanks to a Metro South Health Research co-funded collaboration grant, a joint research collaboration between the Translational Research Institute and PA Hospital is investigating factors at play with inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) and disorders of the gut brain interaction (DGBI).
PAH Director of Gastroenterology and Hepatology Professor Gerald Holtmann said the influx of patients seeking treatment highlighted a need for novel approaches.
“The research team is united by the desire to provide care to patients that we would wish for our family and friends,” Professor Holtmann said.
Western lifestyles, including frequent antibiotic therapy and food additives, have been linked to the prevalence of these gastrointestinal disorders.
“Unfortunately, these increasingly prevalent, multifactorial gastrointestinal disorders currently have limited treatment options and minimal published research to help clinicians better understand the causes and pathophysiology of the disease,” he said.
“This is why continued efforts to unravel the decisive factors of what leads to the diseases and the development of effective diagnostics and therapies are imperative.”
Developing and refining methods to characterise the bacterial communities that lead to IBD could only be achieved by close collaboration between gastroenterologists and microbiologists.
“The key question at the beginning was how to best capture the microbes colonising the small intestine.
“The collaboration with TRI based microbiologists enabled novel approaches to use complementary culture and molecular techniques to define bacterial communities and their relationship to disease,” he said.
The invention of a device that enabled specialists to take samples for future microbial analysis was the first milestone.
“We have created a unique collaboration where scientists from endoscopy take samples and send them directly to the lab to sequence and culture.
“This unique collaboration has resulted in a bio bank for continued research into this important field.”