Can Oral Microbiome Vary with Life Stress in Pregnant Women? Study Sheds Light - Video

The number and type of microbes present in the saliva of pregnant women differ according to whether they are experiencing life stress and symptoms of anxiety, depression and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), finds a study published in the open access journal BMJ Mental Health.

The study included 224 pregnant women enrolled in the Michigan Prenatal Stress Study assessed for recent stresses and mental health symptoms during their second trimester. Women were asked to provide saliva samples during the week of their assessments. The results showed the oral microbiome varied with whether women had reported life stress, anxiety, depression or post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms during the assessments.

Oral microbiomes of women with high levels of post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms showed high beta diversity, which means the specific microbe species in their saliva notably differed from the species found in women with low post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms.

Specific stress and mental health traits were also associated with high levels of certain microbe species. Women who had experienced recent life stress had a greater abundance of species in the phylum Proteobacteria, while Spirochaetes was more abundant in women with high levels of depression symptoms. Greater numbers of Dialister species and species in the phylum Firmicutes were seen in women with levels of anxiety and depression symptoms, and species in the genus Eikenella were elevated in women with high anxiety, depression or post-traumatic stress disorder.

22 potential covariates were investigated to see whether they influenced changes in the microbiome. This analysis revealed that cigarette smoking could explain 7.2% of the variance seen in oral microbiomes, dental problems could explain 3.1%, intimate partner violence could explain 4.1% and unplanned pregnancy could explain 2%.