Agustin Ernesto Martínez Agustin Ernesto Martínez

University of Alicante. Spain

COMPREHENSIVE PERSPECTIVE ON AUTISM: PAIN, GASTRO-INTESTINAL SYMPTOMS, GUT-MICROBIOTA AND PROBIOTICS

Children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are characterized by repetitive behavior and difficulties in social communication. In addition, comorbidity with intellectual disability represents an added difficulty for social communication and the expression of emotions and physical discomfort. Identifying pain is a relevant factor to implement adequate medical and educational treatment. Similarly, gastrointestinal symptoms (GS) and autism symptoms related to sensitivity to certain foods, textures, etc., are associated factors. Thus, there is a high comorbidity of GS in children with ASD. However, standardized instruments are required to assess pain, sensitivity, and GS in the autistic population. In this sense, the so-called Microbiota-intestine-brain axis suggests that there is a dysbiosis or alteration of the gut-microbiota (GM) in ASD, which can trigger the appearance and development of all these symptoms in the child. Recently, a meta-analysis has found low levels of the bifidobacterium bacteria in children with ASD. This bacterium is involved in the regulation of neurotransmitters such as dopamine, etc., that regulate the emotional state. The abundance levels of that bacteria are usually higher in the first two years of the child’s life. For this reason, this decrease in bifidobaterirum provides information on neurodevelopment and the functioning of the Microbiota-intestine-brain axis in ASD. In recent years, there has been an increase in the industrial development of probiotics to treat the symptoms of different mental disorders. However, there are a small number of studies that analyze the efficacy of probiotics in ASD, most of the compounds being based on the bacteria lactobacillus. Future research should consider the efficacy of bifidobacterium-based probiotic compounds. A clinical trial is required to analyze pain symptoms, GS, repetitive behaviors, anxiety levels between the experimental group and a control group, using placebos and different types of probiotics.

CV

Dr. Agustín Ernesto Martínez-González is a Professor in the Department of Developmental and Didactic Psychology at the University of Alicante, Spain. He has completed several Master’s degrees related to clinical psychology and clinical neuropsychology that have provided him with a cross-sectional and neuroeducational perspective of human behavior. In the field of research, he has participated in more than 50 national and international conferences related to educational psychology, neuropsychology, and clinical psychology. Similarly, he has written numerous articles indexed with JCR (Social Science Edition) as well as books and book chapters. His research focus revolves around the repetitive spectrum in several mental disorders (OCD and ASD). In this last sense, he has participated in the validation of scales for OCD in Spanish and Chilean adolescents (OCI-R, OCI-CV, etc.) and of the RBS-R in the Spanish population with ASD and intellectual disability. These latest studies have led to the development of the COREAT app. COREAT is the first app with scientific evidence to detect ASD and measure the severity of repetitive behavior both in people with ASD and in people with intellectual disabilities, following DSM-5 criteria (Martínez-González, 2019). In the field of study of repetitive behavior, Dr. Martínez-González maintains a multidisciplinary and integrative point of view with the aim of studying the relationship between the severity of repetitive behavior and variables such as type of educational center, adaptive behavior, negative emotional symptoms, neuropsychological and neurophysiological bases, gastrointestinal symptoms, and the brain-gut microbiota relationship or gut microbiota. Finally, Professor Martínez-González is the director of the Group for Comprehensive Research in Typical and Atypical Neurodevelopment (GINTA) and editor of the Journal of Disability, Clinic and Neurosciences (RDCN).