Medicine is slowly waking up to the relationship between health and the bacteria in your gut, known as the microbiome.

And it’s just gotten a whole lot more interesting:  the microbiome is all over our body and breast cancer is linked to imbalances in this bacterial population.

Healthy breast tissue has more of a “good” bacteria known as Methylobacterium, say, researchers, who also discovered that the breast area has its own “mini-microbiome”.

This suggests that breast cancer could be treated with prebiotics and probiotics if tissue was being screened for bacterial imbalances, say researchers from the Cleveland Clinic.

They also found that the urine of cancer patients has increased levels of other types of bacteria, including Staphylococcus and Actinomyces.

Other researchers have for a long time suspected that breast tissue has its own microbiome, but the Cleveland team is the first to positively identify it.

The finding suggests that other organs could also have their own min-microbiome to keep bacteria in balance and, in turn, help maintain health.

The researchers examined breast tissue from 78 patients who had a mastectomy, as well as samples from an oral rinse and urine

Source:  Oncotarget,  2017;  8-88122-38

App!  Environ Microbiology, 2016 ; 82,  5039-48

Int J Oncology,  2017;  51:  753-759

PloSOne, 2012, 7: e44132
New York Times, November 13, 1990