TY - JOUR T1 - Digest JF - Gut JO - Gut SP - 475 LP - 475 VL - 53 IS - 4 AU - Robin Spiller Y1 - 2004/04/01 UR - http://gut.bmj.com/content/53/4/475.2.abstract N2 - Suicide and depression are commoner in humans separated from their mother’s at an early age and maternal separation has been used in animals to induce neurotic behaviour. The current study in this month’s Gut used this model to show that early stress induces long lasting increases in both small intestinal and colonic permeability. This was associated with increased bacterial translocation and increased colonic myeloperoxidases, mast cells and inflammatory cytokine expression. The inflammatory response to a chemical injury (TNBS) was also increased. The authors argue that these changes are all secondary to altered permeability. Whether this is in turn due to increased endogenous steroid secretion or due to long term alterations in gut flora is uncertain. This finding has implications for many human diseases and their relation to psychiatric disorders, whose origins may well lie in early childhood stress. See page 501 Repair of defects in the mucosal barrier is dependent on the migration of epithelial cells to cover … ER -