New study establishes IBD severity index

The exercise first had participants decide which hypothetical patient profiles met their evaluation criteria; it then showed them two final profiles and asked which was the more severe case. Survey length depended on the consistency of participants’ responses, with those lacking consistency being given more tasks to complete, Dr. Siegel and his colleagues reported.

Respondents completed the exercise three times: first independently without discussion, then after discussion in a group setting with an automated response system, and finally, independently following group discussion. Disease severity indexes were created on a 100-point scale, and average part-worth utility scores were used to determine minimum and maximum scores for each attribute, with zero representing the absence of a symptom.

Crohn’s disease severity was largely dependent on factors related to intestinal damage, whereas ulcerative colitis disease severity was associated with symptoms and effects on daily life.

This analysis “helps redefine overall disease severity for IBD,” the authors wrote. Once validated, the indexes will offer “both further research opportunities and a practical tool by which to classify overall disease severity of patients and offer appropriate treatment without relying on present symptoms alone,” they added.