Evaluation of Toll-Like Receptor Alteration in Intestinal Biopsies of Patients with Irritable Bowel Syndrome: A Systematic Review

Irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is a functional disorder with an unknown etiology. Some recent studies report the presence of a microscopic inflammation in people with IBS. This micro-inflammation can be due to an alteration in the pattern of recognition receptors especially in Toll-like receptors (TLRs). In this systematic review, we reviewed an evaluated existing studies related to TLRs and their changes in patients with IBS.

Three science citation index databases including Web of Science, Pubmed and Embase were searched for related keywords from September 2000 to September 2018. There was no language restriction. Two reviewers screened and extracted data independently.

A total of 178 records were retrieved and eight eligible studies (265 patients) were included for data extraction and analysis. The results showed that, compared with the healthy group, the expression of some of the TLRs such as TLR2, TLR3, TLR4 and TLR5 increased whereas the expression of some others including TLR7 and TLR8 decreased significantly.

 Alteration of TLRs in patients with IBS can be due to changes in microbiota causing a micro-inflammation. This alteration can have a potential role in pathophysiology of IBS.