Systematic evaluation of risk factors for diagnostic delay in inflammatory bowel disease.

Background: The diagnosis of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), comprising Crohn's disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC), continues to present difficulties due to unspecific symptoms and limited test accuracies. We aimed to determine the diagnostic delay (time from first symptoms to IBD diagnosis) and to identify associated risk factors.

Methods: A total of 1591 IBD patients (932 CD, 625 UC, 34 indeterminate colitis) from the Swiss IBD cohort study (SIBDCS) were evaluated.