P627 Acute severe ulcerative colitis in pregnancy: A retrospective cohort study

Abstract

Abstract Background Ulcerative colitis is a chronic inflammatory condition of the colon with peak incidence rates between the ages of 15 and 35 years. Consequently, women with ulcerative colitis are often diagnosed during childbearing years, which makes the effect of the disease on pregnant patients an important clinical question. Acute severe ulcerative colitis will affect up to 25% of patients. There are limited studies that describe the medical treatment, colectomy rates, and birth outcomes of women hospitalised with acute severe ulcerative colitis during pregnancy. Methods We performed a retrospective observational study of pregnant ulcerative colitis patients hospitalised at two large tertiary medical centres between January 2003 and December 2018. The primary endpoint was colectomy-free survival. Secondary endpoints included details of disease management and fetal outcomes. Results Twenty patients met the inclusion criteria. At admission, the median age was 30.3 years (IQR 23.4–32), and the median gestational age was 21 weeks (IQR 14–28). All patients met Truelove and Witts criteria for acute severe ulcerative colitis. The median follow-up time was 48 months (IQR 20.7–80). Colectomy free survival rates from admission were 90% at six months, 84% at one year, and 64% at four years (Figure 1). Only one patient (5%) underwent colectomy at her index admission. All patients were treated with intravenous steroids, and half received anti-tumour necrosis factor agents as inpatients (7 received infliximab and 3 received adalimumab). Following discharge, seven (35%) patients were maintained on infliximab, four (20%) were maintained on adalimumab, vedolizumab and azathioprine were used as the maintenance drug in one patient each, and another seven (35%) patients were transitioned to mesalamine preparations. Live birth occurred in 18 patients (90%), and the median gestational age at birth was 37 weeks (IQR 34.5–38). Adverse pregnancy outcomes included two spontaneous abortions (10%), six premature births (30%), and four low birth weight infants (20%). There were no stillbirths, and no major congenital abnormalities were noted. Conclusion We report on the largest cohort of pregnant patients hospitalised for acute severe ulcerative colitis and have shown that these patients have good response rates to standard treatments and comparable colectomy rates to studies of non-pregnant patients. In our cohort, there were relatively high rates of preterm and low weight births.