"Does Parkinson’s Begin In The Gut?" - Diana Kwon
A growing body of evidence links the neurodegenerative disease to the gastrointestinal tract, opening new possibilities for treatment. An idea holds that intestinal inflammation, possibly from gut microbes, could give rise to Parkinson’s disease. The latest evidence supporting this idea comes from a large epidemiological study, in which Inga Peter, PhD, professor of genetics and genomic sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and her colleagues scanned through two large U.S. medical databases to investigate the overlap between inflammatory bowel diseases and Parkinson’s. The research team also discovered that in people who received drugs used to reduce inflammation – tumor necrosis factor inhibitors – the incidence of the neurodegenerative disease dropped 78 percent.
- Inga Peter, PhD, Professor, Genetics and Genomic Sciences, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai