COMMENTARY

Crohn's disease

Fistulising Crohn’s disease: MMPs gone awry

D Schuppan, T Freitag

Department of Medicine I, University of Erlangen-Nürnberg, Germany

Correspondence to:
Correspondence to:
Professor D Schuppan
Department of Medicine I, University of Erlangen-Nürnberg, Ulmenweg 18, 91054 Erlangen, Germany; detlef.schuppan@med1.imed.uni-erlangen.de

---

Broadening our understanding of the role of matrix metalloproteinases in Crohn’s disease

---

Keywords: fibrosis; inflammatory bowel disease; proteolysis; matrix metalloproteinases; tissue inhibitor of metalloproteinase; ulcerative colitis; vitronectin receptor; Crohn’s disease; fistulae

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

Fistulae are a common complication of Crohn’s disease (CD), and their most common perianal manifestation is present in 14–38% of CD patients in referral populations.¹ Despite advances in conservative treatment, fistulae rarely heal, while surgical resection is effective but frequently does not prevent local recurrence or fistulising disease at other sites.¹ Remodelling of the extracellular matrix (ECM) is a key event in chronic bowel inflammation,^2,3 especially in CD which is characterised by both active fibrogenesis (that is, ECM production and deposition), leading, for example, to stricture formation, and by enhanced fibrolyis (that is, breakdown and removal of ECM), such as occurs in fistula formation. While fibroblasts and myofibroblasts, and to a minor degree endothelial and epithelial cells, produce the intestinal ECM, many more cell types are involved in ECM breakdown by releasing a broad spectrum of enzymes that can degrade essentially every ECM component, such as the various . . . [Full text of this article]

CiteULike    Complore    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    What's this?

Relevant Article

Expression and localisation of matrix metalloproteinases and their natural inhibitors in fistulae of patients with Crohn’s disease

T Kirkegaard, A Hansen, E Bruun, and J Brynskov
Gut 2004 53: 701-709. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

This article has been cited by other articles:

• Sengupta, N., MacDonald, T. T. (2007). The Role of Matrix Metalloproteinases in Stromal/Epithelial Interactions in the Gut. Physiology 22: 401-409 [Abstract] [Full Text]