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Updated: Jun 8, 2025

Quantitative Polymerase Chain Reaction-based Analyses of Murine Intestinal Microbiota After Oral Antibiotic Treatment
Published on: November 17, 2018
Impacts of Medications on Microbiome-mediated Protection against Enteric Pathogens
Aman Kumar1, Ruizheng Sun1,2, Bettina Habib3
1Department of Microbial Pathogenesis and Microbial Sciences Institute, Yale University School of Medicine, New Haven, CT, USA.
Abstract:
The majority of people in the U.S. manage health through at least one prescription drug. Drugs classified as non-antibiotics can adversely affect the gut microbiome and disrupt intestinal homeostasis. Here, we identified medications associated with an increased risk of GI infections across a population cohort of more than 1 million individuals monitored over 15 years. Notably, the cardiac glycoside digoxin and other drugs identified in this epidemiological study are sufficient to alter microbiome composition and risk of Salmonella enterica subsp. Typhimurium (S. Tm) infection in mice. The impact of digoxin treatment on S. Tm infection is transmissible via the microbiome, and characterization of this interaction highlights a digoxin-responsive β-defensin that alters microbiome composition and consequent immune surveillance of the invading pathogen. Combining epidemiological and experimental approaches thus provides an opportunity to uncover drug-host-microbiome-pathogen interactions that increase infection risk in humans.
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