Crohn's disease over 20 years after diagnosis in a referral population.

Objectives: Patients frequently ask questions about the lifetime prognosis of Crohn's disease. The aim of this study was to describe the outcomes of Crohn's disease more than 20 years after diagnosis.

Methods: Data from all patients with Crohn's disease whose diagnosis had been performed before 1st January 1978 were analyzed.

Colonoscopy accurately predicts the anatomical severity of colonic Crohn's disease attacks: correlation with findings from colectomy specimens.

Objective: For the assessment of colonic Crohn's disease (CCD) attacks, no clinicobiological and/or morphological (endoscopic, radiological) criteria of severity have been validated in relation to anatomical criteria of severity (ACS) as a gold standard obtained from colectomy specimen examination. Our objective was to assess the accuracy of colonoscopy in predicting the anatomical severity grading of CCD.

Methods: Colectomy specimens from 78 consecutive patients operated between 1982 and 1996 for CCD resistant to medical treatment were analyzed and classified into two groups according to the presence (ACS+) or absence (ACS-) of ACS.

Sugar intolerance: origin and mechanisms of symptoms?

The origin and mechanisms of symptoms in sugar intolerance were studied in 8 healthy volunteers. For two test periods, volunteers swallowed a probe with perfused catheters and an infusion catheter which migrated into the colon. A meal containing 40 g lactulose or 40 g sucrose was ingested; the sucrose meal was followed by colonic infusion of 40 g lactulose in order to bypass the small intestine.