The brain microbiome: could understanding it help prevent dementia?

Nikki Schultek , an active and healthy woman in her early 30s , experienced a sudden cascade of debilitating and agonising symptoms including cognitive and breathing problems and heart arrhythmia.

It turned out she had multiple chronic infections, including Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria, which causes Lyme disease and which had stealthily reached her brain.

Antibiotics restored her health, but she may need maintenance treatment to keep the disease at bay.

The Remarkable Complexity of the Brain Microbiome in Health and Disease looked at brains of people who didn’t have dementia and compared them with Alzheimer’s brains.

In the control brains, microbes differed between brain regions and individuals, hosting mainly fungi, bacteria and chloroplastida (algae-related species) The virus adenovirus type C a common culprit for respiratory infections was often present.

BCG has been shown to ward off a host of agerelated conditions, including skin infections and pneumonias.

Being aware of and treating infections around the body in a timely way could also help.

At present, it would be rare for a clinician to test for brain infections, even at the onset of cognitive problems.