Characterization of the gut microbiota of Kawasaki disease patients by a follow-up study with metagenomic analysis

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Kawasaki disease (KD) is an acute febrile illness of early childhood. Previous reports have suggested that genetic factors associated with disease susceptibility, together with an infectious agent as a trigger, could be involved in KD; however, the precise etiology of KD remains unknown. Additionally, previous studies based on culture experiments have suggested a possible role for intestinal microbiota in KD pathogenesis. In this study, we used metagenomics to comprehensively analyze the longitudinal variation within the intestinal microbiota of twenty-eight KD patients. Bacterial species classification suggested that the sequencing reads assigned as similar to six Streptococcus spp. were apparently increased in the acute phase. Our findings suggest that dysbiosis was present in the intestinal microbiota of acute-phase KD patients and that a marked increase in Streptococcus spp. could be associated with KD pathogenesis.