2.3. Effect of Topical Coconut Oil on the Skin Microbiome
We analyzed the effect of coconut oil emollient on within-sample diversity using a linear mixed model with participant ID as a random effect and with site and age as fixed effects. Compared to the control arm, there was a trend towards reduced microbiome richness in the intervention arm (beta = −9.97, 95% CI [−22.68, 2.74], Using qPCR, we analyzed the number of genome copies of CoNS and CoNS DNA was detected by qPCR in 66.8% of all samples. On day 1, CoNS DNA was detected in 40 participants (55.56%) from at least one site. By day 7, 70 participants (97.2%) had detectable levels of CoNS DNA from at least one site, with a concurrent increase in copy number. The CoNS load remained stable from day 7 onwards (For the axilla and ear sites, the median number of CoNS genomes detected was similar between the intervention and control arms at all time points (When all sites were combined, the number of CoNS genomes per swab increased from day 1 to day 7 for both the control and intervention arms (