Our recent paper in BMJ Open Gastroenterology examines trends in endoscopic, medical and surgical admissions for inflammatory bowel disease in England from 2003–2013. In the last decade, there have been major advances in inflammatory bowel disease management but their impact on hospital admissions requires evaluation. We aim to investigate nationwide trends in inflammatory bowel disease surgical/medical elective and emergency admissions, including endoscopy and cytokine inhibitor infusions, between 2003 and 2013.
We used Hospital Episode Statistics and population data from the UK Office for National Statistics. Age-sex standardised admission rates increased from 76.5 to 202.9/100 000. Rising inflammatory bowel disease hospital admission rates in the past decade have been driven by an increase in the incidence and prevalence of inflammatory bowel disease. Lower GI endoscopy and surgery rates have fallen, while cytokine inhibitor infusion rates have risen. There has been a concurrent shift from emergency care to shorter elective hospital stays. These trends indicate a move towards more elective medical management and may reflect improvements in disease control.