Causal association between gut microbiota and fibromyalgia: a Mendelian randomization study

Zhaohua Wang; Dan Jiang; Min Zhang; Yu Teng; Yaojiang Huang

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2023.1305361

Causal association between gut microbiota and fibromyalgia: a Mendelian randomization study

Front Microbiol. 2024 Jan 8:14:1305361. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1305361. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Zhaohua Wang^#^{1

2}, Dan Jiang^#³, Min Zhang^{1

2}, Yu Teng^{1

2}, Yaojiang Huang^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Beijing Engineering Research Center of Food Environment and Public Health, Minzu University of China, Beijing, China.
² College of life and Environmental Science, Minzu University of China, Beijing, China.
³ College of Food Science and Engineering, Dalian Ocean University, Dalian, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Background: Fibromyalgia (FM) is a syndrome characterized by chronic and widespread musculoskeletal pain. A number of studies have implied a potential association between gut microbiota and FM. However, the casual association between gut microbiota and FM remains unknown.

Method: Mendelian randomization (MR) study was conducted using the summary statistics of genetic variants from the genome-wide association study (GWAS). Inverse variance weighted (IVW), combined with MR-Egger and weighted median were used to investigate the causal association between 119 gut microbiota genera and FM. Sensitivity analyses were performed on the MR results, including heterogeneity test, leave-one-out test and pleiotropy test.

Results: A total of 1,295 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNPs) were selected as instrumental variables (IVs), with no significant heterogeneity and pleiotropy according to the sensitivity analyses. Five gut microbiota genera were found to have significant casual association with FM. Coprococcus2 (OR = 2.317, p-value = 0.005, 95% CI: 1.289-4.167), Eggerthella (OR = 1.897, p-value = 0.001, 95% CI: 1.313-2.741) and Lactobacillus (OR = 1.576, p-value =0.020, 95% CI: 1.073-2.315) can increase the risk of FM. FamillyXIIIUCG001 (OR = 0.528, p-value = 0.038, 95% CI: 0.289-0.964) and Olsenella (OR = 0.747, p-value = 0.050, 95% CI: 0.557-1.000) can decrease the risk of FM.

Conclusion: This MR study found that gut microbiota is casually associated with FM. New insights into the mechanisms of FM mediated by gut microbiota are provided.

Keywords: Mendelian randomization; causal association; fibromyalgia; gut microbiota; gut-brain axis.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This study was funded by Double First Class University Plan (MOE, China Ministry of Education) and the Minzu University 985 Academic Team-Building Fund (No. 2018MDTD25C) and Beijing Municipal Science and Technology Commission.