The majority of the studies reported a high burden of work-related outcomes among inflammatory bowel disease patients regardless of the methodology used .
Inflammatory bowel disease patients experience a high burden in work-related outcomes .
BACKGROUND & AIMS Inflammatory bowel disease has considerable effects on work-related outcomes and leads to high societal costs due to sick leave and disability pension .
The aims of this study were to systematic ally review evidence on work-related outcomes that are relevant to productivity losses and to evaluate whether medical or surgical interventions have a positive impact on patients ' work ability .
Morbidity and functional outcome after restorative proctocolectomy for ulcerative colitis.
OBJECTIVE To find out whether a threefold increase in follow up ( median 108 compared with 36 months ) influenced major morbidity and functional outcome between the first 32 and the last 32 patients consecutively operated on with J-pouch ileoanal anastomosis for ulcerative colitis from 1984 to 1997 . DESIGN Retrospective and prospect i ve study . SETTING University hospital , Norway . PATIENTS 64 patients with ulcerative colitis who had proctocolectomy and ileal pouch-anal anastomoses .  INTERVENTIONS The pouches were mainly h and anastomosed ( n = 61 ) to the dentate line after mucosectomy or anastomosed by double stapling technique without mucosectomy ( n = 3 ) . The 58 patients who still had their pouches responded to a question naire on functional outcome and satisfaction . MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES Morbidity , functional outcome , and patients ' satisfaction . RESULTS Major morbidity in these 64 patients comprised pelvic sepsis in 3 ( 5 % ) , operation for intestinal obstruction in 5 ( 8 % ) , pouchitis in 12 ( 19 % ) , fistulas in 7 ( 11 % ) and pouch excision in 6 ( 9 % ) . Thirteen patients ( 20 % ) had 35 reoperations and 11 patients ( 17 % ) had 22 re-laparotomies . There were more complications among the first 32 patients with the longest follow up than among the last 32 patients , but this difference was significant only concerning the rate of reoperations ( 31 % compared with 9 % ) because of the higher number of pouch excisions ( 5 compared with 1 ) in this group . There were no significant differences in the functional outcome and degree of patient satisfaction between the first 29 and the last 29 patients . Respective values for 24 hour median stool freqency were 7.0 and 6.3 , leakage of stool 48 % and 38 % , ability to defer defaecation 86 % and 97 % , perineal irritation 59 % and 48 % , use of antidiarrhoeal medication 55 % and 52 % , and wearing of pad 28 % and 38 % . Sexual life ( n = 57 ) was improved in 11 ( 19 % ) and reduced in 7 ( 12 % ) . Potency was reduced in 5 ( 15 % ) and ejaculation in 4 ( 12 % ) , one of whom ( 3 % ) had retro grade ejaculation . Three ( 5 % ) received disability pensions and five ( 9 % ) had reduced workload . After the pouch operation 48 ( 91 % ) felt better and 3 ( 6 % ) felt worse because of frequent bowel emptying , perineal eczema , or pouch fistula . CONCLUSION Continence-preserving proctocolectomy carries considerable morbidity , but the long term functional outcome is satisfactory and does not seem to deteriorate substantially
The majority of the studies reported a high burden of work-related outcomes among inflammatory bowel disease patients regardless of the methodology used .
Inflammatory bowel disease patients experience a high burden in work-related outcomes .
BACKGROUND & AIMS Inflammatory bowel disease has considerable effects on work-related outcomes and leads to high societal costs due to sick leave and disability pension .
The aims of this study were to systematic ally review evidence on work-related outcomes that are relevant to productivity losses and to evaluate whether medical or surgical interventions have a positive impact on patients ' work ability .