Survey Results: The Unmet Needs of IBD 2020

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a term that refers to several diseases that are characterized by inflammation in the digestive tract. The most common of these are Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, but IBD also includes diseases such as microscopic colitis (lymphocytic colitis and collagenous colitis), diversion colitis, ischemic colitis, and radiation enteritis. IBD can cause many life-altering symptoms, including, but not limited to, severe abdominal pain, frequent diarrhea (sometimes up to dozens of times per day), rectal bleeding, fever, nutritional deficiencies, and weight loss. Treatment is complex and highly personalized, with most people requiring lifelong adherence to medications as well as dietary and lifestyle modifications, and some requiring surgery.

The Gastrointestinal Society, along with the Canadian Society of Intestinal Research, hosted a survey on its English (www.badgut.org) and French (www.mauxdeventre.org) websites from September 27, 2019 to September 13, 2020 about the unmet need of IBD, particularly in regard to communication between patients and their physicians. This was a follow-up to a survey we conducted in 2018. However, our original survey was only for Canadians. For this survey, we opened it up to global input. The only qualifying factor was an IBD diagnosis.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW SURVEY RESULTS

We’d like to acknowledge the support of many health organizations, IBD patient advocates, and healthcare professionals in Canada and around the world for sharing our survey. It is through collaborative efforts that we can achieve greater awareness of the healthcare needs of individuals living with IBD. Some of these organizations include:

IBD Support Australia (Australia)
NPO-Crohn-RCUH Association (Belgium)
IMAGINE SPOR Network (Canada)
Canadian Digestive Health Foundation (Canada)
Inside Out Stoma Support Group (Europe)
DigestScience (France)

Many patient advocates and healthcare professionals also shared our survey on their social media channels and networks. We can’t thank them enough for helping us gain the perspectives of their patient and caregiver communities.