Glen Doherty © ECCO

The revised pipeline for updating of ECCO Guidelines was recently established. This pipeline envisages updates to the two main guidelines on treatment of Crohn’s Disease and Ulcerative Colitis in adults every 3 years. Other ECCO Guidelines will be updated approximately every 5 years. Having just completed publication of the first ECCO Guideline on treatment of Crohn’s Disease in adults employing GRADE methodology, work is now underway on a similar update to the main ECCO UC Guideline. Similar to the 2019 Crohn’s Disease Guideline, the updated UC Guideline will employ GRADE methodology to address most of the key questions, covering both medical and surgical treatments.

Henit Yanai © ECCO

The 18^th IBD Intensive Advanced Course took place before the ECCO Congress as the highlight of the educational programme, which runs in conjunction with the Congress.

This well-known course, which has been held almost since the inception of ECCO, took place once again, attracting a full attendance from Europe and elsewhere. Overall, 94 doctors attended the course from 37 countries and were treated to a comprehensive update on IBD.

Marietta Iacucci © ECCO

In 2020 the ECCO Endoscopy Workshop reached its 6^th edition, and it has now become a mainstay of the educational activities of ECCO. Since 2019 the Endoscopy Workshop is a part of the ECCO-ESGAR Basic Imaging Workshop. The workshop was organised by the ECCO Education Committee (EduCom), and was devoted to and structured for physicians or colorectal surgeons who are specialists in IBD with at least some experience in endoscopy.

Christian Maaser  © ECCO

At ECCO 2020 two ultrasound workshops were held. The 2^nd ECCO-ESGAR Basic Imaging Workshop was devoted to the basics of intestinal ultrasound (IUS) and MRI. In this workshop, gastroenterologists from ECCO who are experts in intestinal ultrasonography and radiologists from the European Society of Gastrointestinal and Abdominal Radiology (ESGAR) who are experts in IBD jointly provided delegates with a full immersion in imaging in IBD. 

Sophie Restellini © ECCO

Julien Kirchgesner © ECCO

The Epidemiological Committee (EpiCom) organised the 5^th EpiCom Workshop at the ECCO’20 Congress in Vienna. The delegates were welcomed by Marieke Pierik, who introduced the concept of patient-reported outcomes (PRO) with the aid of a clinical case. The discussion continued by examining discrepancies between what a treating physician defines and sees as a response to therapy and the perceptions of the treated patient. Physician and patient may hold different views on the effectiveness of a treatment, particularly if the physician bases the evaluation of treatment success solely on improvements in clinical, biochemical and endoscopic measurements, without considering the patient’s quality of life and wellbeing. Integration of PROs into the evaluation can play a pivotal role in overcoming this issue.

Shaji Sebastian © ECCO

The mission of ClinCom is to promote investigator-initiated studies among ECCO Members. The Committee welcomes submissions from investigators and national study groups and evaluates and critically appraises the quality, feasibility and practicality of each study proposal. The 5^th IBD National Study Group Meeting, held on February 12 during the ECCO 2020 Congress, featured presentations from five investigators on proposals for high-quality collaborative studies which will be suitable for running across national study groups.

Uri Kopylov  © ECCO

This year’s 7^th ClinCom Workshop focussed on two main topics. The first session was devoted to sequencing and combination of different IBD treatments for IBD. The speakers addressed the possible biological implications of drug sequencing and the mechanistic changes in the inflammatory pathways.

Krisztina Gecse © ECCO

Peter Bossuyt © ECCO

The ECCO Congress offers an ideal opportunity to learn, share and interact. This was also the main purpose of the 5^th Basic ECCO: EduCational COurse for Industry, held on Wednesday, February 12, 2020.  The course aimed to provide corporate and non-corporate members who have recently entered the field of IBD with an introduction to IBD, focussing on the clinical essentials and ‘need-to-knows’. 104 participants from 23 countries attended the course.

Sebastian Zeissig  © ECCO

One of the main goals of ECCO is to promote IBD-related basic and clinical research as well as to foster interaction and productive collaboration among European research groups working in the IBD field. To achieve this goal, ECCO supports numerous funding schemes with different scopes including ECCO Fellowships, Grants, and Travel Awards.

Efficacy and safety of mirikizumab in a randomized phase 2 study of patients with Ulcerative Colitis

Sandborn WJ, Ferrante M, Bhandari BR, Berliba E, Feagan BG, Hibi T, Tuttle JL, Klekotka P, Friedrich S, Durante M, Morgan-Cox M, Laskowski J, Schmitz J, D'Haens GR

Gastroenterology. 2019;doi: https://doi.org/10.1053/j.gastro.2019.08.043. [Epub ahead of print]

Introduction

Hajir Ibraheim © Hajir Ibraheim

Interleukin-23 (IL23) contributes to the pathogenesis of chronic inflammatory diseases, including Ulcerative Colitis (UC), by maintaining and amplifying T helper 17 cells and stimulating many innate immune cells. IL-23 is a heterodimeric cytokine composed of a p40 subunit (shared by IL12) and a p19 subunit (IL-23p19). Ustekinumab, a monoclonal antibody targeting the shared p40 subunit, is effective for treatment of Crohn’s Disease (CD) and psoriasis [1–3]. However, studies in patients with psoriasis have suggested that selective targeting of the IL23 pathway by blocking IL-23p19 is more effective than ustekinumab [4, 5]. Whilst promising phase 2 results have been observed in CD patients following treatment targeting IL-23p19 [6, 7], the role of this therapeutic strategy in UC is unknown. Mirikizumab (LY3074828) is a humanised immunoglobulin G4 (IgG4)-variant monoclonal antibody that binds to the IL-23p19 subunit. The current study evaluated the efficacy and safety of mirikizumab for the treatment of patients with moderate-to-severely active UC.