6 Myths About IBD, Debunked

The notion that IBD is a one-way ticket to lifelong suffering from which there is no relief comes up a lot, Axelrad says. His response is simple: “There are really a lot of options from a therapeutic standpoint to improve patients’ quality of life, reduce inflammation, and reduce complications,” he says. And he should know, not only as a physician in the field but as someone who also lives with Crohn’s.

 How Your Diet Can Help Reduce IBD Symptoms

Before diving into options for what you might put on your plate and in your body if you have IBD, know that experts emphasize that dietary changes aren’t a wholesale substitute for medical treatment.

 Inflammatory Bowel Disease – Addressing the "hidden" disease with innovative, multidisciplinary and patient-centric care

The last two decades have seen an explosion in the therapeutic arsenal for IBD; the development of biologics and novel oral agents has revolutionised the management of the condition. A sizeable number of patients can achieve mucosal healing and endoscopic remission with these drugs. These advances have supported improved treatment goals that now include complete clinical, biochemical and endoscopic remission of IBD.

A to Z of IBD

When I talk about IBD I'm often faced with blank stares and so here is my A-Z guide to Inflammatory Bowel Disease.

Not Just a Pooping Disease: 10 Things You Didn't Know About Inflammatory Bowel Disease

These diseases have been known primarily as "pooping diseases" because many patients frequent the bathroom as a result of the cramping and abdominal pain caused by IBD. However, there are many aspects of the disease that are far worse than spending time in the bathroom.

IBD: How a class of killer T cells goes rogue in inflammatory bowel disease

The very features that make memory T cells so desirable for vaccines – their capacity to live for such a long time and mount a stronger response when they encounter a microbial invader for the second time – may explain why autoimmune diseases are chronic and lifelong.

Explainer: what is inflammatory bowel disease?

The disease is one of a variety of unrelated but ongoing gastrointestinal disorders. Of these, some of the most common complaints are about gluten intolerance and functional bowel problems (when the gut doesn’t work properly, such as when someone has irritable bowel syndrome). Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis are examples of inflammatory bowel disease. All of these problems have very different causes, although having one of them may put you at an increased risk of developing another.

IBD Academy: Treatment with 5-ASAs and Corticosteroids

Understanding the medications used to treat inflammatory bowel disease can help you to be a knowledgable part of your healthcare team. Many individuals with IBD end up taking a whole series of medications before their doctors find the one(s) that work for them. There are four major classes of drugs used to treat IBD: aminosalicylates (5-ASAs), corticosteroids, immunomodulators, and biologics.

IBD Is More Than ‘Just a Bathroom Disease’

When people think of Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, they usually think, “it’s just a bathroom disease” or “it’s just a bad stomach ache.” What they don’t consider is the multitude of ways that inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD) impact the 5 million people worldwide living with these diseases.

IBD Patients on the Most Effective Ways Doctors Can Treat Their Condition

“We need to change the narrative and refocus our collective efforts on advancing the research and translation of novel therapeutics into clinical practice,” she says. “It’s not enough to focus only on disease awareness initiatives. We’re all aware. Now we need action.”

Inflammatory bowel disease imaging: Current practice and future directions

The paper discusses, in detail the pros and cons of the different IBD imaging modalities that need to be considered in order to optimize the imaging and clinical evaluation of patients with IBD.

Inflammatory Bowel Disease in the Emergency Department

Patients with IBD frequently present to the emergency department for the treatment of flares. It is the role of the emergency physician to resuscitate and restore fluid and electrolyte balance, evaluate and control pain/fever/nausea, and to identify manifestations of IBD requiring urgent and emergent intervention (obstruction, intra-abdominal abscess and fistula formation, life-threatening hemorrhage, and toxic megacolon).

Inflammatory bowel disease: clinical aspects and treatments

Although there is no cure for IBD, we now have sufficient evidence that several pharmaceutical compounds are able to dampen the intestinal inflammation. This review provides an overview of the experimental studies done using monoclonal antibodies and anti-inflammatory drugs. Most of the results reported in the papers show that anti-inflammatory compounds can inhibit the proliferation of cytokines such as TNF-α and IFN-γ, but unfortunately have potential side effects, including vomiting, diarrhea, and nausea.

The Connection Between IBD and Aging

Even more underappreciated is the growing population of people who are diagnosed with the disease after they turn 60. Whereas IBD was once taught as a disease with two spikes in onset—20s to 30s, and 40s to 50s—doctors are learning there is a third spike that begins later in life. “Now we know you can be 75 and get IBD,” says Dr. Simon Hong, a gastroenterologist and IBD specialist at NYU Langone Health.

These Environmental Factors Increase the Risk of IBD

During the past 60 years, experts have documented a steep rise in the incidence of both ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s disease—the two medical conditions that make up most cases of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). For decades, this rise was confined to North America, Western Europe, and other industrialized nations. While there’s some evidence that the rise in IBD has slowed down or even plateaued in those places, IBD is becoming increasingly common in newly industrialized countries in Asia and other parts of the world.

This common toothpaste ingredient could be wreaking havoc on your gut

Even if you’ve never heard of it, you’ve almost certainly come across triclosan. A highly effective antibacterial and antifungal ingredient, triclosan is found in all kinds of toothpastes, hand sanitizers, deodorants, mouthwashes, detergents, cleaning supplies—if you use household products, you’re interacting with triclosan every day. So it’s worrying that a new study, published in Science Translation Medicine on Wednesday, suggests that triclosan exposure could increase rates of colitis and colon cancer.

What Living With IBD Has Taught Me About Being A Doctor

aving a close relationship to IBD has taught me about the urgent need for medical advances and cures for the disease.

A Surprise Medical Solution: Hypnosis

Major hospitals are finding hypnotherapy can help sufferers of digestive conditions like heartburn, colitis, acid reflux and irritable bowel syndrome.

Could Viruses Attacking The Microbiome Be Responsible For Inflammatory Bowel Disease?

New research done in a mouse model of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) has suggested that viruses called phages, which have the ability to infect and kill gut bacteria, may be involved in the disease.

Cure Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) Without Medication

I’m here to tell you it’s possible to alleviate symptoms of inflammatory bowel diseases, like Crohn’s and Ulcerative Colitis and it doesn’t always have to take dangerous medications. You can do so with a change in diet or by consuming healing nutraceuticals...

Diagnosing Crohn's disease and Ulcerative Colitis

More sophisticated blood tests are now being used to help distinguish between Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis. The newer tests look at proteins called antibodies, which are produced by the immune system. There are two antibodies of long-standing interest. • Perinuclear anti-neutrophil antibodies (pANCA) • Anti-Saccharomyces Cerevisiae antibody (ASCA)

Fecal Transplants: a New Treatment for IBD

While the burgeoning use of FMT may seem like a wonder of modern medicine, the practice reportedly dates back to ancient China, where “yellow soup” was used to treat cases of severe food poisoning and diarrhea.

Hope for People with IBD and Those at Risk

A cure remains elusive because we don’t know what causes IBD. However, the recent mapping of the human genome (the complete set of a person’s genetic information) has strengthened our grasp of how genes relate to complex immune diseases like IBD.

How hot peppers and marijuana could help cure gut problems

When our gut’s immune system starts acting more like that of the rest of the body, the gut gets inflamed and starts attacking its own cells. The end result is illness. Diseases like celiac (an autoimmune reaction to gluten) and ulcerative colitis (one of two types of Inflammatory Bowel Disease, the other being Crohns) occur when the gut’s immune system starts treating food, and our own body, like an interloper. These conditions often leaves sufferers in tremendous pain and at an increased risk of both malnutrition and colon cancer. But if researchers could figure out how to calm down that immunological response, it might be possible to create a treatment.

Microplastics may be linked to inflammatory bowel disease, study finds

People with IBD have 50% more microplastics in their faeces but more research needed to confirm connection.

New Therapies for Bowel Diseases

“Ulcerative colitis and Crohn’s are in many ways the poster child for which sequencing the genome is having a tremendous impact,” Dr. Xavier said in an interview. Equally important to improved treatment has been understanding how environmental factors like diet and antibiotics can disrupt the balance of microbes in the gut. Some bacteria are protective and keep the gut healthy, while others result in chronic inflammation.

Speaking Up About an Uncomfortable Condition

Bowels, especially those that don’t function properly, are not a popular topic of conversation. Most of the 1.4 million Americans with inflammatory bowel disease — Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis — suffer in silence. But scientists are making exciting progress in understanding the causes of these conditions and in developing more effective therapies. And affected individuals have begun to speak up to let others know that they are not alone.

Treating Disease by Nudging the Microbes Inside Us

We’ve spent centuries trying to kill bacteria. Now, scientists have shown that subtler approaches can work—at least in mice.

Weighing the new approaches to treating Crohn's and ulcerative colitis

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), which includes Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC), is a condition that involves inflammation of the digestive tract. In recent years, treatment options for IBD have rapidly expanded. The goal of these newer treatments is to improve control of inflammation in the gut, which can greatly improve patients' quality of life.

What’s Life Like With a J-pouch? One Woman’s Story

A few weeks after my ulcerative colitis diagnosis, I began blogging in an effort to inform other people who might feel unsure about life with UC. When I mentioned on my site that I'd undergone an ileal pouch-anal anastomosis (IPAA) surgery series, which involved three major operations to remove my colon and construct my J-pouch, the most common question I received on social media was “What’s life like with a J-pouch?”

Why we all need to be proactive about our bowels

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a mounting burden on health-care systems globally.