Évolution de la maladie de Crohn luminale chez les enfants au courant de la dernière décennie et facteurs associés à la mise en rémission rapide et durable des patients, une étude de cohorte rétrospective au CHU Sainte-Justine, Montréal

Crohn's disease (CD) has a high incidence in the pediatric population in North America. The etiology of CD remains unknown and the disease incidence has been increasing. The natural evolution of CD is misunderstood, especially in the pediatric population. The trends of time-to-remission over the years and the influencing factors are very limited in the literature. Few risk factors are identified in the literature to predict relapses of the disease in children. The first part of this study was to describe the trends in the clinical phenotype, endoscopic, histological, and laboratory characteristics of pediatric CD during the last decade and to describe the seasonal variation of disease presentation at diagnosis. The secondary part of this study was to describe the time to remission in children with CD as well as its evolution over the past decade and to determine factors associated with time to remission. The third part of the study was to describe the rate of relapses in children with CD, its evolution over the past decade and to determine risk factors associated with relapse of the disease.  Eligible patients were aged from 4 to 18 years and diagnosed between 2009 and 2019. All clinical, endoscopic, histological, laboratory and treatment data were collected from their medical records. Survival analyses and linear regression models were used to assess the impact of those factors on time to remission. Likewise, survival analyses and Cox regression models were applied to assess the impact of those risk factors on relapse.  A total of 654 patients were included in this retrospective cohort study. The number of new diagnoses per year increased over the decade. Patients diagnosed between 2015 and 2019 had a lower age at diagnosis (OR 2.53, 95% CI [1.29; 4.98]), more perianal diseases (OR: 2.30, 95% CI [1.52; 3.48]), more granulomas (OR: 1.61, 95% CI [1.17; 2.22]), but less eosinophils (OR: 0.35, 95% CI [0.25; 0.48]) and less chronic lympho-plasma cells infiltrate (OR: 0.56, 95% CI [0.36; 0.86]) on ileo-colonic biopsies compared to patients diagnosed in 2015-2019. There were fewer diagnoses of CD in children in winter. Patients diagnosed in fall had lower PCDAIs and less failure to thrive. CD diagnosed in spring and summer had lower hemoglobin levels and higher erythrocyte sedimentation rate levels. In addition, arthritis and erythema nodosum were more frequent in spring and summer. Colonic location was significantly more frequent in summer and fall.    There was no change in the time to clinical remission over the past decade. Female sex in adolescents (adjusted bêta regression coefficient (aβ)= 31.8 days, p=0.02), upper digestive tract involvement (aβ= 46.4 days, p=0.04) perianal disease (aβ= 32.2 days, p=0.04), presence of active inflammation on biopsies (aβ= 46.7 days, p=0.01) and oral 5-ASA exposure (aβ= 56.6 days, p=0.002) were all associated with longer time to clinical remission. However, antibiotic exposure (aβ= -29.3 days, p=0.04), increased eosinophils on biopsies (aβ= -29.6 days, p=0.008) and combination of exclusive enteral nutrition and TNF-alpha inhibitors as induction therapy (aβ= -36.8 days, p=0.04) were associated with shorter time to clinical remission.    There has been a decrease in the relapse rate over the past decade : 69.6% in patients diagnosed between 2009 and 2014 and 47.8% in patients diagnosed between 2015 and 2019 (p<0.0001). Female sex (adjusted hazard ratio (aHR) = 1.51, p=0.0009), high PCDAI (aHR= 1.02, p=0.04) and SES-CD (aHR= 1.03, p=0.03) scores at diagnosis, upper digestive tract involvement (aHR= 1.59, p=0.0003), exposure to oral 5-ASA (aHR= 1.91, p=0.0003), use of immunomodulatory agents compared to TNF-alpha inhibitors (methotrexate aHR= 1.91, p=0.0006; thiopurines aHR= 2.06, p<0.0001), presence of granulomas (aHR= 1.27, p=0.04) and increased eosinophils on biopsies (aHR= 1.34, p=0.02), high levels of C-reactive protein (aHR= 1.01, p<0.0001) and fecal calprotectin (aHR=1.09, p<0.0001) during clinical remission and low serum infliximab levels during maintenance (aHR for mean serum infliximab level under 7ug/mL = 2.48, p=0.005) were all significantly associated with relapse in patients.  The disease phenotype has changed over the years and important trends in the frequency and severity of diagnoses exist according to the diagnosis period within a year, suggesting etiological hypotheses such as vitamin D deficiency in winter, seasonal bacterial and viral colitis and academic stress. Many of the results of the study are original and brought new knowledge while confirming certain statements which had not obtained consensus in recent studies of expert opinions and some could be incorporated into management guidelines of pediatric CD to short time to remission and avoid relapse in patients.

Keyphrases: Crohn’s disease, Pediatrics, Epidemiology, Remission, Relapses, Risk factors, Disease phenotype, TNF-alpha inhibitors