A study published in MicrobiomeJ finds that overgrowth of Enterococcus in neonates with critical congenital heart disease is associated with gut barrier impairment and high inflammatory responses, implicating in poor surgical prognosis. Read the paper:
]. In view of long-lasting hyoxemia and abnormal gut perfusion secondary to poor cardiac output in neonates with CCHD, gut dysbiosis and epithelial barrier impairment are postulated to be implicated in metabolic disorders and inflammatory cascades.
In this study, we performed an integrated analysis of fecal metabolomics and metagenome sequencing of paired samples from neonates with CCHD and healthy controls . We aimed to systematically characterize the early life gut microbiome in neonates with CCHD in three dimensions and uncover its implications on the host metabolic phenotype; reveal the ecological interaction between the gut viral and bacterial communities and unravel its impacts on the overall microbial configuration.