New Research Evaluates Evolution of Crohn's Symptoms Over Time
How was the data gathered?
The first study was conducted to research the effects that living in urban households had on a person's risk of developing Crohn's disease. The study was conducted by a team of researchers from the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario and headed by Dr. Eric Benchimol, one of the lead authors of the study, a scientist at the Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, and a pediatric gastroenterologist at the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario. The research suggested that children who group up in urban households seem to be at a greater risk for developing Crohn's disease.
The study was completed in 2017 and published in the American Journal of Gastroenterology on July 25, 2017. The completed study included 45,567 patients and found that 38,905 of the patients had lived in urban households while only 6,662 patients lived in rural households between 1999 and 2010. The urban households included in the study were all Canadian provinces.
Both of the research studies included a variety of information on where people lived between 15 years old and 30 years old and if they had been diagnosed with IBD leading up into 2003. The records of 238,000 patients were included and the patients ranged from 25 years old to 55 years old. The participants were also to mail in questionnaires that included information regarding their health every two years. As per the requirements of the research study, none of the original participants had IBD at the point in which they enrolled in the study.
