Inflammatory Bowel Disease Analysis

Crohn’s disease (CD) is a systemic auto-immune disease that is marked by abnormal inflammation of the gastrointestinal (GI) tract, it affects any part of the GI tract from mouth to anus. CD mainly presents in three areas: the small intestine, the colon, and the perianal region. CD mostly occurs between the ages of 15 and 30 years, or between the ages of 60 and 80 years of age. The exact etiology of Crohn’s disease is unknown. As stated by Mazal (2014) “Genetic predisposition—especially familial aggregation—seems to be the strongest independent indicator of which individuals will develop Crohn disease” (p.298). An increase diet in milk protein, milk protein and polysturated fatty acids is also a possible factor in disease incidences. Smoking may also double the risk of developing CD.

The sheer diversity of the microbiota means that bodily disorders associated with the gut region (encompassing the stomach and intestines) are difficult to diagnose, and even harder to find the source of the disorder. Intestinal Bowel Disease (IBD) is a large category of bodily disorders associated with the gut. IBD most commonly manifests itself in two forms – Crohn’s Disease, and Ulcerative Colitis [1]. Crohn’s disease is arguably a more severe form of the disease, as the diseased tissue tends to go deeper into the intestines. Ulcerative Colitis, while still very detrimental and pain causing, causes inflammation of tissue at more of the surface level. The diseases affects a significant portion of the population, with a high rate of new cases discovered - between 20,000 and 100,000 people are diagnosed with types of IBD annually in North America [1]. The role of the microbiota in inducing intestinal diseases has been suspected.

As the number of people over the age of 65 grows, so does the incidence of Crohn’s disease in that population. Crohn’s disease is already a difficult disease to manage, but in the elderly they may have more comorbidities and take more medications that make managing Crohn’s disease even more difficult. Because of lower thresholds for admitting older patients, increased likelihood of seeking medical care, increased adverse effects to medications, and more pre-existing comorbidities, older patients more likely to be hospitalized for Crohn’s disease (Ha & Katz, 2014). When older adults are hospitalized for any bowel disorder, it puts them at even higher risks for malnutrition, dehydration, infections including Clostridium difficile, and higher rates of other hospital related adverse events, such as thromboembolisms, pneumonia, and pressure sores (Ha & Katz, 2014). Crohn’s can be miserable for elderly patients, as they often do not have the resilience that younger patients have and do not usually bounce back as

“The colon cancer vs. Crohn’s disease debate is generating a lot of interest in the medical community. Every year in the U.S., approximately 57,000 people die from colorectal cancer and 147,000 new cases are diagnosed”states Dr. Victor Marchione. Crohn's disease is a new disease that was introduced into today's society in 2015. 1.4 million Americans have Crohn’s disease or ulcerative colitis. Of those, about 700,000 have Crohn’s has been diagnosed in the years between 1992 and 2004 just from a doctor's visit. People have came up with different ways that we can help and prevent the disease such as Surgery, Conferences and “ KEY TO PROCESS “.

The next topic discusses the significant challenges facing the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation of America today and in the near future. One of the major challenges of the organization is finding ways to help with the insurance and financial burdens for the IBD patients. In 2004, there were 1.1 million hospital and healthcare visits for Crohn’s disease and 716,000 for Ulcerative Colitis, as well as 4 million prescriptions written for both these diseases (Crohn’s and Colitis, 2012). Unfortunately, the annual financial burden of IBD in the United States is more than 31 billion dollars, which demonstrates how expensive the physician visits, hospital stays, and medications are for IBD patients. For example, studies have estimated the annual direct

Website dedicated to Crohn’s and Colitis. This specific page within the website talks about diet with inflammatory digestive diseases. However, contradictory to many of the other articles and websites, this one states that diet does not in fact play as a major contributor in contracting an inflammatory disease. However, they do state that diet can help manage symptoms after diagnosis. This article is to help guide patients to understand Crohn’s and how to best control

This disease can be overwhelming physically, emotionally, and financially. Crohn’s Disease is very unpredictable so those who live with it have to be careful from day to day and make sure to listen closely to their bodies. According to the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation of America (2014) “living with this disease can also be very expensive. Direct medical costs include expenses for hospitalizations, physician services, prescription drugs, over-the-counter drugs, skilled nursing care, diagnostic procedures, and other healthcare services. Indirect costs are the value of lost earnings or productivity. Indirect costs also include the value of leisure time lost” (p.19). However, the good thing is that patients can still lead a happy and productive

To give a short overview of the steps that will be taken to complete the study. Obtaining stem cells, whether adult, embryonic or induced, shall be done using healthy mouse models and after ethical approval has been gained. The process to derive them will be detailed below, however they are also purchasable commercially with the benefit of being well studied and accompanied by a detailed analysis of properties, however with a

This review will explain Crohn’s disease and Ulcerative colitis, two types of inflammatory bowel disease that affect millions of people. These diseases are chronic that affects certain parts of the intestine gastrointestinal tract. People who has this disease are troubled with a variety of side effects that they will have to live with for the rest of their lives. To this day, there are no medical cure for these diseases, however there are several treatment options that are helpful. These diseases are still being studied for researchers to fully understand the causes, possible preventions, and cure for IBDs. Countless researches and studies are still under development, there have been many discoveries thus far, but nothing concrete.

In western population alone, 140 people per 100 000 are diagnosed with Crohn’s disease annually. This results in an estimated cost of €3.04bn a year in the European healthcare system [1]. As a chronic inflammation of the bowel, Crohn’s patients require frequent check-ups and therapies to regulate their symptoms and maintain remission of this debilitating disease. This is often done through the use of corticosteroids (an anti-inflammatory drug) or the more modern technique of biological therapies. Although effective in many cases, these therapies often have severe long term side effects or are simply ineffective in forcing the disease into remission. As a result, there is a

Mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) are abundant in various tissues such as umbilical cord, adipose tissue, bone marrow and the liver. Previous research has demonstrated that the intradermal injection of umbilical cord-derived MSCs do not trigger an allergic reaction and hence the limited capacity of UCMSCs. In another study by Mao et al., the intramuscular injection of hUCMSCs did not cause inflammation, effusion or ulceration at the points of injection (7). Moreover, the injection in rats did not alter the heart, kidney and liver function. The results from these studies portray intramuscular injection of hUCMSCs as a possible administration

Scientists are interested in stem cells for their ability to become any type of cell in the body, a process called differentiation. Theoretically, this allows for limitless possibilities in disease

“Through the isolation and manipulation of cells, scientists are finding ways to identify young, regenerating ones that can be used to replace damaged of dead cells in diseased organs. This therapy is similar to the process of organ transplant, only the treatment consists of the transplantation of cells rather than organs. The cells that have shown by far the most promise of supplying diseased organs with healthy cells are called stem cells.” (Chapter Preface)

ISCs were first identified by BrDU label retention method (Cheng and Leblond, 1974). After 30 years, Clevers and colleagues identified ISCs at single cell resolution by lineage tracing. They found that Lgr5 gene, encoding the leucine-rich repeat-containing G-protein coupled receptor 5, is expressed in ISCs and LGR5+ cells give rise to all four different kind of intestinal epithelial cells (Barker et al., 2007).In addition, LGR5+ cells cultured in vitro give rise to organoid expressing all the markers of intestinal epithelium (Sato et al., 2009). Potential stem cell niche for ISCs consist of Paneth cells, dispersed in between ISCs. In vitro, growth

This essay will focus on Crohn’s disease and pathological changes that may occur in the small intestine as a result of the inflammatory process and discuss the scientific reasons for the possible treatments relating these to pathological processes.