A modern view of the urinary tract microbiome

Abstract

This review presents the latest date on the urinary tract microbiome (UTM). Finding of a resident microbiome of UTM has become an unexpected discovery in recent years. It was found that slow-growing fastidious or nutritionally demanding species, including anaerobic bacteria, predominate among the microbial inhabitants of the UTM. In this regard, there is an urgent need to revise some aspects of generally accepted diagnostic schemes, the picture of pathogenesis and approaches to the treatment of urinary tract infections, which previously based on the idea of the urinary tract sterility.  The concept of a “healthy microbiome” of the urinary tract continues to be developed. The need to compare microbiological findings with the clinical signs was once again confirmed. It has been shown that changes in the intestinal microbial community directly affect the microflora of urinary tract. Therefore, one of the promising approaches for the treatment of chronic urinary tract infections is considered to be the creation of complex multicomponent synbiotics including normal inhabitants of the intestinal tract and substrates necessary for their growth. Probiotics, fecal transplantation and special diets are already used in the complex treatment of chronic urinary tract infections. The avalanche-like growth in the number of the human microbiome studies allows us to expect significant progress in their practical application in the near future.