Weekend Links: IBD and Race, Surgery Rates IBD Falling!, Vitamin D & Crohn's, Paneth Cells, and Poop Pills

Risks of Inflammatory Bowel Disease Between Racial and Ethnic Groups
This article discusses the rate at which various types of ethnic groups get diagnosed with IBD. What I also learned is that it is estimated that 1.8 million adults have IBD (usually the estimate is around 1.0-1.1 million).  What is interesting is that Non-Hispanic Whites have the highest rate (70.2 people/100,000 people) while Hispanics have the lowest rate at (9.9 people per 100,000). However the article concluded that deaths and hospitalizations and deaths from IBD was higher in Non-Hispanic Blacks. So to summarize white individuals are more likely to get IBD, however African Americans are more likely to be hospitalized and die from it.

Changes in medical treatment and surgery rates in IBD (1979-2011)
Long term studies like this always interest me. This study found that the chances of requiring surgery (for Crohn's disease) over a 5 year period have decreased from 44.7% (if you got diagnosed between 1979-1986) to 19.6% (if you were diagnosed between 2003-2011). I was diagnosed in 2011 so the percentage might actually be lower since people didn't  use biologics until after 2008.  The requirement of surgery for UC also decreased from 11.7% (if diagnosed from 1979-1986) to 7.5% (if diagnosed between 2003-2011). I have seen other studies that show the cumulative risk of surgery increases over time. However, other factors like how severe the disease is, the age at which you are diagnosed, and the location of the disease can play a factor in when you need surgery and how often.

Stool Banks for Fecal Transplants: Crap Now Worth Something!
As someone who earlier this year had c difficle and then a fecal transplant at the Mayo Clinic I am always interested in fecal transplants. This story is interesting in that Dr. Lawrence Brandt believes that in the future there will be stool banks just like blood and sperm banks which makes sense consider the stool can be used to save people with c difficile. What would be interesting is people actually getting paid for their crap! What would even be more interesting is if certain stuff is more valuable in terms of a curing c difficile. Also if people knew they could get paid to donate their stuff they make have an incentive to take care of themselves and not do things that may exclude them from being a donor (taking an antibiotic, living a risky lifestyle, etc.). Fecal transplants are also being studied in other disease such as Parkinson's, obesity, and even IBD. It would be nice to study if certain fecal material is better than others in helping people with these horrible illnesses.

Too Much Vitamin D for Crohn's Patients?
This article on vitamin D is interesting because it often contradicts what I have heard saying that people with Crohn's usually have low levels of vitamin D. What is interesting is right before I was diagnosed with Crohn's my doctor told me to take a vitamin D supplement (which in all honesty does make me feel better when I take it. The research was done by Dr. Maria Abreu (she is with the University of Miami IBD department). In the study (which is in Gut magazine) showed that Crohn's patients 42% of patients have "inappropriately high" levels of vitamin D levels. The same was true for 7% of patients with UC. The theory is high vitamin D levels are most likely a manifestation of the underlying gut inflammation.

New clinical trial for antibiotic to help Crohn's (possible cure?) 
Dr. Saleh Naser out of UCF College of Medicine has spent 18 years studying mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP) in Crohn's disease. There is a debate in the scientific community as to what actually causes Crohn's disease. Dr. Naser is trying to enlist 240 patients in a clinical trials for basically what is an antibiotic therapy. There is also a test being developed to see what patients have MAP in their systems in order to determine who would benefit most from the new treatment. What is very promising is that Dr. Naser believes that patients with the treatment may instantly improvement and this could possibly believe a cure for Crohn's if MAP is truly the underlying cause.

Paneth Cells Role in Inflammation for Crohn's Disease
According to this article from Nature . This Science Daily article breaks the research down into plain English. What the research shows is that there may actually be subsets of Crohn's disease. What was learned is that Paneth cells' play a role in inflammation for inflammatory bowel disease. Hopefully, this will lead to more targeted therapies for Crohn's.

Poop Pills: Now Serving C Difficile Patients
Speaking of fecal transplant apparently Dr. Thomas Louie out of University of Calgary developed a "poop pill" to help people who suffered from c difficile. I know people in the media will say "poop pill" how gross and make fun of the name. However, there is nothing funny about c difficle (I know I have been through it and felt like I was partly dying). At any rate, 32 patients were treated with the pills and didn't have a recurrence of c difficile which is a 100% success rate. If fecal transplants could be done in pills instead of via colonoscopy it would be far cheaper, easier, and free up doctors to do procedures on people who might need them more (people who may have colon cancer). This pill came faster than I thought. I thought it would take many years to develop this but apparently it is here faster than we could have imagined.