Crohn's disease
hideCrohn's disease (also known as granulomatous colitis and regional enteritis) is an inflammatory disease of the intestines that may affect any part of the gastrointestinal tract from anus to mouth, causing a wide variety of symptoms. It primarily causes abdominal pain, diarrhea (which may be bloody), vomiting, or weight loss, but may also cause complications outside of the gastrointestinal tract such as skin rashes, arthritis and inflammation of the eye.
Crohn's disease is an autoimmune disease, in which the body's immune system attacks the gastrointestinal tract, causing inflammation; it is classified as a type of inflammatory bowel disease. There has been evidence of a genetic link to Crohn's disease, putting individuals with siblings afflicted with the disease at higher risk. It is understood to have a large environmental component as evidenced by the higher number of cases in western industrialized nations. Males and females are equally affected. Smokers are three times more likely to develop Crohn's disease. Crohn's disease affects between 400,000 and 600,000 people in North America. Prevalence estimates for Northern Europe have ranged from 27–48 per 100,000. Crohn's disease tends to present initially in the teens and twenties, with another peak incidence in the fifties to seventies, although the disease can occur at any age.
There is no known pharmaceutical or surgical cure for Crohn's disease. Treatment options are restricted to controlling symptoms, maintaining remission and preventing relapse.
The disease was independently described in 1904 by Polish surgeon Antoni Leśniowski and in 1932 by American gastroenterologist Burrill Bernard Crohn, for whom the disease was named. Crohn, along with two colleagues, described a series of patients with inflammation of the terminal ileum, the area most commonly affected by the illness. For this reason, the disease has also been called regional ileitis or regional enteritis.
For more information about Crohn's disease, read the full article at
Wikipedia.
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News tagged with crohn s disease
Probiotic found to be effective treatment for colitis in mice
Oct 26, 2009 |
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The probiotic, Bacillus polyfermenticus, can help mice recover from colitis, a new study has found. Mice treated with B. polyfermenticus during the non-inflammatory period of the disease had reduced rectal bleeding, their tissues ...
Discovery of genetic defect may lead to better treatments for common gut diseases
Oct 08, 2009 |
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New findings related to an uncommon genetic disorder may impact the diagnosis and treatment of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), the most common chronic gastrointestinal illness in children and teens. Two ...
Predictors of disease behavior change in Crohn’s disease
Aug 10, 2009 |
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A research team from Hungary investigated the probability of disease behavior changes in a well-characterized Crohn's disease cohort with strict clinical follow-up. They found that perianal disease, small bowel disease, smoking, ...
Cannibalistic cells may help prevent infections
Aug 03, 2009 |
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Infectious-disease specialists at UT Southwestern Medical Center have demonstrated that a cannibalistic process in cells plays a key role in limiting Salmonella infection.
Novel genetic finding offers new avenue for future Crohn's disease treatment
Jul 09, 2009 |
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Researchers from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine identified a novel link between ITCH, a gene known to regulate inflammation in the body and NOD2, a gene which causes the majority of genetic Crohn's Disease ...
Stem cell focus for IBD wound healing
Apr 28, 2009 |
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Scientists at The University of Nottingham are investigating whether stem cell markers could have a role to play in speeding up wound healing in patients suffering from inflammatory bowel disease (IBD).
A dead gene comes back to life in humans
Mar 06, 2009 |
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(PhysOrg.com) -- Researchers have discovered that a long-defunct gene was resurrected during the course of human evolution. This is believed to be the first evidence of a doomed gene - infection-fighting human ...
New gene-searching method uncovers possible new targets for Crohn's disease drugs
Feb 26, 2009 |
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Discovering the different genes that contribute to a complex disease is like searching in the proverbial haystack for an unknown number of needles--some much smaller than others, often blending into the background, and many ...
Are we selling personalized medicine before its time?
Feb 06, 2009 |
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We may be a long way off from using genetics to reliably gauge our risks for specific diseases, say researchers at the University of Pittsburgh Graduate School of Public Health in a study published on Feb. 5 in the online ...
Infliximab may help prevent post-operative Crohn's disease recurrence
Feb 01, 2009 |
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The administration of infliximab after intestinal resective surgery was found to be effective at preventing endoscopic and histological recurrence of Crohn's disease, according to a new study in Gastroenterology, the official ...
Children with inflammatory bowel disease have surprisingly high folate levels, study finds
Jan 24, 2009 |
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Children with newly diagnosed cases of inflammatory bowel disease have higher concentrations of folate in their blood than individuals without IBD, according to a new study led by researchers at the University of California, ...
For fats, longer may not be better
Jan 08, 2009 |
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Researchers have uncovered why some dietary fats, specifically long-chain fats, such as oleic acid (found in olive oil), are more prone to induce inflammation. Long-chain fats, it turns out, promote increased intestinal absorption ...
Researchers discover gene that increases susceptibility to Crohn's disease
Jan 08, 2009 |
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Researchers at McGill University, the Research Institute of the McGill University Health Centre (RI MUHC) and the McGill University and Génome Québec Innovation Centre, along with colleagues at other Canadian ...
