New research finds that there is significant variation in the anatomy of the human digestive system, with possible pronounced differences between healthy individuals. The finding has implications for understanding the role that the anatomy of the digestive tract may play in affecting human health, as well as providing potential insights into medical diagnostics and the gut’s microbial ecosystem.
“There was research more than a century ago that found variability in the relative lengths of human intestines, but this area has been largely ignored ever since,” says study co-author Amanda Hale, Ph.D. candidate at North Carolina State University. “When we started exploring this topic, we were surprised by the magnitude of the variability we found.”
“If you’re talking to four different people, it’s very likely that they all have different intestines, in terms of the relative sizes of the organs that make up that system,” says Erin McKenney, the study’s corresponding author and assistant. professor of applied ecology at NC State. “For example, the cecum is an organ that sits at the nexus of the large and small intestines. One person might have a cecum that is a few centimeters long, while another might have a cecum the size of a purse. And we found similar variability for many digestive organs.”
In another surprising example, researchers found that women tend to have larger small intestines than men.
“Because having a longer small intestine helps you extract nutrients from your diet, this finding supports the channeling hypothesis, which posits that women are better able to survive during periods of stress,” says Hale.
“Since there is more variation in human gut anatomy than we thought, this could inform our understanding of what is driving a variety of health-related problems and how we treat them,” says McKenney. “Basically, now that we know that this variability exists, it raises a number of research questions that need to be explored.”
For this study, the researchers measured the digestive organs of 45 people who donated their remains to the Duke University School of Medicine Anatomical Gift Program.
In addition to shedding light on the unexpected variability of human anatomy, this project also led to the rediscovery of the importance of teaching anatomical variation to medical students.
“It’s particularly important in medical education, because if students are only learning about ‘normal’ or ‘average’ anatomy, that means they won’t be familiar with the extent of human variation,” says Roxanne Larsen, co-author of the paper. and associate professor of veterinary and biomedical sciences at the University of Minnesota. “It is becoming increasingly clear that the field of medicine is moving toward individualized medicine to improve patient outcomes and overall health and well-being. Gaining experience in understanding anatomical variation can play a critical role in help future physicians understand the importance of individualized medicine.
“We are excited about this discovery and future directions of work,” says McKenney. “It underscores how little we know about our own bodies.”
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