Abstract
To assess whether or not liver transplantation and subsequent immunosuppression with cyclosporine and prednisone affect ulcerative colitis symptomatology, we surveyed by questionnaire all 23 surviving patients with pretransplant colonoscopy-documented ulcerative colitis who were transplanted for primary sclerosing cholangitis between June 1982 and September 1985. At follow-up [89.8±7.6 weeks (mean±sem], all six patients who had had asymptomatic colonoscopy-documented ulcerative colitis reported continued ulcerative colitis quiescence. Among the 17 patients who had had symptomatic colonoscopydocumented ulcerative colitis at time of liver transplantation, 88.2% reported improvement in overall ulcerative colitis severity (P<0.001), with significant improvement in the frequency of bowel movements reported by 100%, in crampy abdominal pain by 87.5%, in bowel urgency by 75%, in the occurrence of pus or mucus in stool by 87.5%, in the incidence of ulcerative colitis flares by 81.8%, and in the number of days unable to function normally due to ulcerative colitis symptoms by 78.6% (all at leastP<0.01). These data demonstrate that ulcerative colitis symptom severity significantly improves following liver transplantation with immunosuppression with cyclosporine and prednisone.
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This work was supported in part by NIDDK grant DK 32556 and by NIAAA grant AA06601.
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Gavaler, J.S., Delemos, B., Belle, S.H. et al. Ulcerative colitis disease activity as subjectively assessed by patient-completed questionnaires following orthotopic liver transplantation for sclerosing cholangitis. Digest Dis Sci 36, 321–328 (1991). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01318204
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01318204