Leading article

The 10 remaining mysteries of inflammatory bowel disease

Jean-Frédéric Colombel¹, Alastair J M Watson², Markus F Neurath³

¹ Hôpital Claude Huriez, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Lille, Lille, France
² School of Clinical Sciences, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK
³ First Medical Clinic, University of Mainz, Mainz, Germany

Professor Alastair Watson, School of Clinical Sciences, The Henry Wellcome Laboratory, Nuffield Building, University of Liverpool, Crown Street, Liverpool L69 3BX, UK; Alastair.watson@liv.ac.uk

Revised version received 27 October 2007

Accepted 13 November 2007

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

Tremendous progress has been made in our understanding of the pathobiology of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD: Crohn’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC)) through research on mouse models of gut inflammation, human population genetics studies and immunological research.^1–4 However, despite these important advances, many of the primary features of human IBD remain unexplained.

In this article we pose a series of 10 fundamental questions about the epidemiology and clinical course of IBD that remain unanswered to this day. In order to obtain "best guess" answers to these questions, we have interviewed experts who are leaders in the field of each question. This article is a distillation of their opinions which we hope will refocus future research onto these remaining mysteries (Box 1) which are essential for improving the clinical management of IBD.

WHAT EXPLAINS THE GEOGRAPHICAL AND HISTORICAL VARIATION IN THE INCIDENCE OF IBD?

The incidence of IBD has risen sharply in the last 50 years in the USA and western European . . . [Full text of this article]

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