Research Article

Functional Bowel Disorders Are Associated with a Central Immune Activation

Table 1

Characteristics of the participants in the two groups with comparisons between the groups.

Variables (number of subjects in the analyses if less than 66)Neurological group
Depression group
Statistics
value

Female12/19 (63%)25/47 (53%)0.586
Age (years)47 (14)45 (14)0.506
BDI-II6.5 (6.7)30.4 (12.6)<0.001
IBS6/19 (32%)27/47 (57%)0.102
IBS-SSS ()113 (88)200 (103)0.003
INF-γ serum (pg/ml)63.1 (29.2; 83.0)54.7 (29.2; 86.4)0.025
IL-1ra serum (pg/ml)180 (117; 268)161 (94; 1825)0.027
IL-10 serum (pg/ml)4.05 (2.10; 8.55)2.99 (0.69; 12.72)0.040
TNF serum (pg/ml)30.9 (4.5)29.8 (5.5)0.459
TNF/IL-10 ratio serum7.24 (3.80; 16.19)9.77 (2.99; 31.88)0.029
Exotaxin-CSF (pg/ml) ()2.30 (0.99; 27.79)1.44 (0.53; 57.73)0.042
IL-10-CSF (pg/ml) ()1.64 (0.36)1.53 (0.32)0.251
TNF-CSF (pg/ml) ()1.60 (0.96)1.43 (0.80)0.470
TNF/IL-10 ratio CSF ()1.0 (0.7)1.0 (0.5)0.731
Kynurenine serum (μM) ()2.00 (0.58)2.17 (0.53)0.286
Tryptophan serum (μM) ()56.5 (11.1)58.1 (12.4)0.640
K/T ratio × 1000 serum ()36.1 (9.7)38.2 (10.1)0.447
Kynurenine CSF (μM) ()0.055 (0.037; 0.097)0.057 (0.032; 0.148)0.572
Tryptophan CSF (μM) ()2.12 (1.56; 6.23)2.07 (1.36; 144.50)0.708
K/T ratio × 1000 CSF ()26.4 (7.0)27.1 (12.2)0.823
Propionic acid faeces (mmol/l) ()1.77 (1.11)1.57 (1.33)0.582
Butyric acid faeces (mmol/l) ()2.02 (1.63)1.40 (1.24)0.142
PmB in faeces (mmol/l) ()−0.25 (0.76)0.16 (0.53)0.031

The results are given as number and proportion (%), mean with standard deviation, and median with range. Fisher’s exact test (marked with ), t-test, and Mann–Whitney U test () were used for the comparisons between the groups. BDI-II: Beck Depression Inventory-II; IBS: irritable bowel syndrome; IBS-SSS: irritable bowel syndrome symptom severity score; INF-γ serum: interferon gamma in serum; IL-10-CSF: interleukin 10 in the cerebrospinal fluid; TNF serum and TNF-CSF: tumor necrosis factor in serum and tumor necrosis factor in the cerebrospinal fluid; PmB: propionic acid minus butyric acid; K/T ratio × 1000: kynurenine/tryptophan ratio × 1000.