Yves Panis © ECCO

As chair of the S-ECCO Committee, it is my pleasure to introduce a newly elected member for 2019, Pär Myrelid, who will stay for 3 years, up to February 2022. Thus, the current members of the S-ECCO Committee are: Michel Adamina (Winterthur, Switzerland) (who will be, after me, the next chair), Yves Panis (Clichy, France) (chair up to February 2020), Christianne Buskens (Amsterdam, who will stay up to February 2021), Hagit Tulchinsky (Tel Aviv, who will also stay up to February 2021) and Pär Myrelid.

Marjo Campmans- Kuijpers © ECCO

The importance of nutrition in IBD Management is increasingly recognised. Of course, the best evidence that nutrition deserves a place in IBD Treatment is the fact that exclusive enteral nutrition (EEN) is the primary treatment in children with active Crohn’s Disease (CD). In addition, some dietary patterns are associated with the outcomes in IBD, and recently it was shown that partial enteral nutrition, accompanied by a special CD exclusion diet, is as effective as EEN and brings into remission even those patients who fail on biologics.

Antonino Spinelli © ECCO

GuiCom has earned the reputation of being one of the busiest ECCO Committees. Looking at the number and importance of the ongoing projects in 2019, it is evident that this fame is well deserved: it is sufficient to mention the near completion of the new Crohn’s Disease (CD) Guidelines and the launch of the upcoming Ulcerative Colitis (UC) Guidelines.

Naila Arebi © ECCO

While the traditional role of epidemiology was the study of communicable diseases, it has evolved to a modern approach geared towards the study of the increasing incidence of non-communicable chronic diseases. Epidemiology may be defined as the collection of large sample sizes and the measurement of numerous variables from stored samples to facilitate estimation of disease risk over time, and may involve the development and use of new techniques to acquire dependent and independent variables [1]. Nevertheless, the traditional view of epidemiology remains embedded as the study of epidemics. In studying Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IBD) as an epidemic, several aspects were addressed at ECCO'19 Copenhagen Congress, including changes in the incidence/prevalence of IBD in different populations (countries), effects of therapy on surgical rates, the incidence of complications such as colorectal cancer, the impact of treatment patterns and findings in smaller sub-populations such as patients with elderly-onset and perianal Crohn’s Disease (CD). Although the modern definition carries a risk that studies will be conducted without a specific hypothesis thereby generating statistically significant observations of no clinical relevance nor benefit, the studies presented at ECCO 2019 addressed clinically important questions.

Erwin Dreesen © ECCO

Targeting endoscopic outcomes through combined pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic monitoring of infliximab therapy in patients with Crohn’s Disease

In the multicentre, randomised, controlled TAILORIX trial, it was not possible to show a benefit of infliximab dose escalation based on a combination of pharmacokinetic monitoring (i.e. serum concentrations of infliximab) and pharmacodynamic monitoring (i.e. symptoms and biomarker) as compared to dose escalation based on symptoms alone [1]. However, infliximab dose escalations only commenced after the induction regimen. In the current post hoc pharmacokinetic–pharmacodynamic analysis of TAILORIX, we examined the roles of pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic monitoring during infliximab induction and maintenance therapy for targeting endoscopic outcomes [2].

Proactive adalimumab trough measurement is associated with improved treatment outcomes in children with Crohn’s Disease: The PAILOT randomised controlled trial

Amit Assa © ECCO

Loss of response (LOR) during anti-TNF treatment for Crohn's Disease (CD) is commonly approached through the measurement of trough concentration (TC) and anti-drug antibodies, with subsequent modification of treatment (reactive therapeutic drug measurement, TDM). It is appealing to speculate that tailored treatment based on routine TC and antibody measurements (proactive TDM) may assist in sustaining adequate drug levels and thus in improving efficacy and preventing the evolution of anti-drug antibodies. Nevertheless, two randomised controlled trials, the TAXIT [1] and the TAILORIX [2], have failed to demonstrate superiority of level-based over clinically based adjustment of infliximab treatment. To date, there are no prospective studies comparing proactive vs reactive TDM in paediatric CD nor are there any studies evaluating the proactive approach among adults or children treated with adalimumab. Hence, we aimed to investigate the effect of proactive drug monitoring-based treatment, in comparison with clinical and biologic-based monitoring of disease activity in children with CD treated with adalimumab.

Janneke van der Woude © ECCO

During the ECCO’19 Copenhagen Congress the Scientific Committee cordially welcomed Marc Ferrante as a new member.

Marc Ferrante has been an individual member of ECCO since 2008 and has contributed to several ECCO Activities and Initiatives. He was one of the Y-ECCO Founders and Y-ECCO Chairs. His career in ECCO continued in 2015 with a position on ClinCom, and he subsequently became chair of this committee in 2017. 

The educational programme of the 15^th Congress of ECCO starts prior to the official start of the ECCO Congress and courses take place from February 12-15, 2020. These activities target ECCO’s different interest groups including young gastroenterologists, surgeons, paediatricians, IBD Nurses, dietitians, allied health professionals and scientists.

An overview of these activities can be found below. Please note that courses/workshops may run concurrently. As these educational activities have a limited capacity, we encourage you to register at your earliest convenience.

We look forward to seeing you in Vienna!

The Scientific Programme of the 15^th Congress of ECCO provides attendees the unique opportunity to learn from the world’s leading specialists in the field of Inflammatory Bowel Diseases. Held from Wednesday to Saturday, February 12-15, 2020, the Scientific Programme is structured around basic science, translational medicine and clinical sessions. Additionally, it includes oral presentations of the 40 best abstracts of the Congress. The focus of all sessions is clinical practice founded on science with practical take home messages and, as every year, the congress registration fee includes access to all scientific sessions.

Register now and seize the opportunity to hear current and relevant studies from international experts in IBD!

Nuha Yassin  © ECCO

Ignacio Catalán-Serra © Ignacio Catalán-Serra

For this second issue of ECCO News in 2019, we would like to continue to review the excellent scientific content presented at the recent annual ECCO´19 annual meeting held in Copenhagen.

We would like to focus our attention this time on the contribution of the Y-ECCO Members, summarizing the five Y-ECCO Abstract Awards for this year, as well as to provide a comprehensive review of the ten awarded digital oral presentations (DOP).

We hope that this representation of high-quality research combining epidemiological, basic and clinical aspects of inflammatory bowel disease is of interest for a wide range of ECCO Members and helps encourage and inspire future innovative work.