PREDICTIVE FACTORS FOR DEVELOPING SMALL BOWEL OBSTRUCTIONS AFTER ILEAL RESECTION IN PATIENTS WITH CROHN'S DISEASE

Abstract Background and Aims Patients with Crohn’s disease (CD) may require small bowel resections. Unfortunately, some of these patients may develop post-operative small bowel obstructions (SBO). Many clinicians perceive ileal resections dramatically increase the risk of developing SBO in the future, but the incidence and risk factors to developing SBO are poorly described. The primary aim of this study is to document the incidence and factors associated with the development of SBO not related to recurrence of disease in CD patients that undergo ileal resection. We also sought to assess long-term outcomes of this complication. Methods We performed a retrospective cohort study including patients aged 18 years or older with CD, who have had ileocecal resection with ileocolonic anastomosis or segmental small bowel resection. Data abstracted included demographics, phenotype and therapies of CD, disease recurrence post-ileal resection and multiple surgical variables. The primary outcome was the development of SBO within 5 years post-surgery not including obstructions secondary to recurrence of CD. Results 92 total patients were included in the analysis. All had a colonoscopy within a year of the surgery. The mean Rutgeerts score was 0 (interquartile range [IQR] 0 to 2) and the mean short endoscopic score was 0 (IQR 0 to 4). The remainder of baseline characteristics are shown in Table 1. At 6 months, 1 year, and 5 years, the rate of SBO was 4/92 (4%), 6/92 (6.5%), and 15/92 (16%), respectively. Throughout follow-up, only 5 patients had an SBO attributed to intra-abdominal adhesions and only 2 patients required surgical lysis of adhesions. Patients that were found to have histologic inflammation in the margins of the resected bowel specimen had a significantly higher chance of developing an SBO within 5 years of the initial surgery (OR: 4.5 [95%CI: 1.3–15.3], p=0.02 - Table 2). Conversely, patients with either active endoscopic and/or radiologic inflammation on post surgical surveillance colonoscopy did not have a higher risk of developing an SBO within 5 years of the initial surgery (p=0.37). Finally the length of bowel resected at the index surgery was not associated with the development of an SBO (AUC: 0.62, p=0.18). Conclusions The incidence of SBO after ileal resection in CD is low and resolves with medical management on most cases. Inflammation in the margins of the resected bowel and previous bowel resections were associated with new SBO within 5 years. These results must take into account the study population were monitored and cannot be extrapolated to those patients that lost follow-up.