Millions of children in under-resourced parts of the world suffer from malnutrition and, consequently, stunted growth. Protein-based therapeutic foods designed to restore health are lifesavers for many, but a significant number of malnourished children do not respond to available therapies.
But now, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have found that mice with poor gut health similar to that of malnourished, stunted kids benefited from a therapeutic regime that combines dietary protein with a metabolism-boosting therapy and a bile acid-reducing drug. The findings, published Jan. 3 in Science Translational Medicine, could offer a new approach to treating stunted kids who don’t respond to dietary intervention alone.
“It’s a challenge to help children who don’t respond to therapeutic food,” said Ta-Chiang Liu, MD, PhD, an associate professor of pathology & immunology and the study’s senior author. “Meanwhile, the long-term health consequences on their physical and cognitive development are significant. We are excited about our new findings because we have identified two potentially targetable pathways that may be responsible for the abnormalities in the tissue of the small intestine that we see in these kids. Further, our research indicates that a currently available drug that reduces bile acid potentially could allow these children to respond to food therapy.”