A novel non-invasive biomarker based on oral microbiome dysbiosis for detection of Community-Acquired Pneumonia

Abstract

Abstract Background: Early diagnosis of pathogenic bacteria is crucial for the treatment of community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), but conventional diagnostics are limited by sampling difficulties. Oral microbiota has also been explored as a noninvasive biomarker of lung diseases, but it’s role in CAP has been neglected. We aimed to investigate whether the oral bacteria can be novel non-invasive biomarkers for CAP. Methods: Oral swab samples were collected from 29 patients with CAP and 26 healthy volunteers and characterized based on clinical parameters and 16S rRNA profiling of oral bacteria. A predict functional profiling was performed for the functional and metabolic changes in oral microbial communities. Results: Oral microbial of patients with CAP had a lower diversity than healthy group. And the dominant bacteria were Streptococcus, Prevotella and­ Neisseria in CAP. Higher abundance of­ Prevotella (particularly Prevotella_melaninogenica), ­Veillonella and ­ Campylobacter, and lower abundance of Neisseriaand ­ Fusobacterium were detected in CAP group. Analysis of the functional potential of oral microbiota demonstrated that the pathway involving infectious disease was overrepresented in the CAP groups relative to that in the healthy controls. Conclusions: Oral microbial dysbiosis was found in patients with CAP, supporting the use of this non-invasive specimen for biomarkers of CAP.