Gut microbiome alterations in canine idiopathic epilepsy: a pairwise case-control study.

Authors

Yixuan Yang, Julie Nettifee, M Andrea Azcarate-Peril, Karen R Muñana, Benjamin Callahan

Published in

Animal microbiome. Jul 11, 2026. Epub Jul 11, 2026.

Abstract

Idiopathic epilepsy (IE) is the most common chronic nervous system disorder of dogs, and its cause is poorly understood. Emerging evidence suggests that microbiome alterations can occur with IE via the microbiota-gut-brain axis. Therefore, we analyzed the fecal microbiomes of 98 dogs (49 IE, 49 control) in a pairwise case-control observational study using 16S rRNA gene sequencing.
Although the microbial community was mostly similar between groups, IE was associated with a modest but significant shift in weighted UniFrac distance (p = 0.042). We used six differential abundance (DA) methods to identify differentially abundant amplicon sequencing variants (ASVs) between IE and control groups. Notably, one Collinsella ASV was found to be significantly more abundant in IE dogs by all six methods. The gut microbial compositions varied drastically across households (accounting for about 69% of the total variation), but did not have significant differences between sex, age, or breed. Phenobarbital administration in IE dogs had a significant effect on seizure control, and was not associated with changes in the microbiome.
Our findings suggest a relationship between gut microbiomes and IE. However, the specific mechanism needs to be further investigated.

PMID:
42436588
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 12 Jul 2026.

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