Paediatric inflammatory bowel disease may increase incidence of VTE, finds study

Canada has reported the highest incidence of paediatric Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) in the world. IBD is a group of intestinal disorders that cause inflammation of the gut. Recent studies suggest venous thromboembolism (VTE) is a well-known complication of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in adults, however limited data exist about the risk in children. M. Ellen Kuenzig and their team reported the incidence of VTE among children with and without IBD. The study has been published in Journal of Crohn's and Colitis.

The objective of the study was to evaluate the risks of occurrence of VTE Venous thromboembolism in children with IBD and those without IBD. Risks in children has very limited amount of data presented so far, hence the study was designed to evaluate the risks.

The researchers conducted a matched cohort study within a distributed network of population-based Canadian provincial health administrative databases. Children below 16 years diagnosed with IBD were identified using validated algorithms from administrative data in Alberta, Manitoba, Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Québec and compared to age and sex-matched children without IBD. Hospitalizations for VTE within five years of IBD diagnosis were identified. Generalized linear mixed-effects models were used to pool province-specific incidence rates and incidence rate ratios (IRR) with 95% confidence intervals (CI). Hazard ratios (HR) from Cox proportional hazards models were pooled with fixed-effects meta-analysis.