Abstract
Background
Gastrointestinal (GI) symptoms of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) may go undiagnosed resulting in diagnostic delay.
Aims: To determine the frequency and duration of GI symptoms in the decade before the diagnosis of Crohn’s Disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) and risk factors for delayed specialist review.
Methods
We used the Clinical Practice Research Datalink, a nationally representative research database, to identify incident cases of CD and UC diagnosed from 1998 to 2016. Comparison cohorts without IBD were matched 4:1 for age and sex and assigned the IBD diagnosis date of their matched IBD patient as a pseudo-diagnosis date. We compared the prevalence of GI symptoms between the IBD and comparison cohorts in the 10 years before IBD diagnosis. We identified individuals with chronic GI symptoms lasting more than 6 weeks and measured their time to receiving a specialist review with a gastroenterologist, paediatric gastroenterologist or colorectal surgeon. We identified risk factors for receiving specialist review after presenting with chronic GI symptoms.
Results
We identified 5874 incident cases of CD, 13,681 incident cases of UC and comparison cohorts of 78,114 individuals. 10% of the CD and UC cohorts reported GI symptoms to their primary care physician 5 years before diagnosis.
Fewer than 50% of patients were reviewed by a specialist within 18 months of presenting to their primary care physician with chronic GI symptoms. Patients with a previous diagnosis of Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) or depression were less likely to receive timely specialist review (IBS: HR 0.77, 95%CI 0.60–0.99, depression: HR 0.77, 95%CI 0.60–0.98).
Conclusion
A substantial number of individuals experience GI symptoms many years before receiving a diagnosis of IBD. IBS and depression are risk factors for delayed specialist review. Rapid diagnostic pathways should be established to reduce the burden of diagnostic delay in IBD.
Clinical utility of fecal calprotectin: potential applications beyond inflammatory bowel disease for the primary care physician
