Inflammatory bowel disease in children of middle eastern descent.

Christina Mai Ying Naidoo,Steven T Leach,Andrew S Day,Daniel A Lemberg

doi:10.1155/2014/906128

Abstract

Increasing rates of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) are now seen in populations where it was once uncommon. The pattern of IBD in children of Middle Eastern descent in Australia has never been reported. This study aimed to investigate the burden of IBD in children of Middle Eastern descent at the Sydney Children's Hospital, Randwick (SCHR). The SCHR IBD database was used to identify patients of self-reported Middle Eastern ethnicity diagnosed between 1987 and 2011. Demographic, diagnosis, and management data was collected for all Middle Eastern children and an age and gender matched non-Middle Eastern IBD control group. Twenty-four patients of Middle Eastern descent were identified. Middle Eastern Crohn's disease patients had higher disease activity at diagnosis, higher use of thiopurines, and less restricted colonic disease than controls. Although there were limitations with this dataset, we estimated a higher prevalence of IBD in Middle Eastern children and they had a different disease phenotype and behavior compared to the control group, with less disease restricted to the colon and likely a more active disease course.

Highlights

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic, relapsing, idiopathic inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract
A control group of patients of nonMiddle Eastern descent was identified from the SCHR IBD database: these were matched to patients of Middle Eastern descent according to age at diagnosis, gender, and disease type
There was no difference for any of the therapies between the groups for the management of ulcerative colitis (UC). This is the first study comparing the incidence, presentation, and management of IBD in a Middle Eastern pediatric population residing in a “Western” country

Summary

Introduction

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic, relapsing, idiopathic inflammation of the gastrointestinal tract. Emerging data has suggested that the incidence of IBD is increasing globally in both developed and developing countries [3]. One study from Central Saudi Arabia on the epidemiology of juvenile onset IBD estimated an incidence of 0.5 per 100 000 per year and a prevalence of 5/100 000 [4]. While this is significantly lower than the incidence rates of 11.43/100 000 per year reported in North America [5], comparison with older data suggests an increasing incidence [4]

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