THORACIC MANIFESTATIONS OF INFLAMMATORY BOWEL DISEASE

PURPOSE: Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is associated with diverse pulmonary manifestations, and it remains difficult to determine whether those are secondary to medications or the underlying process.Little is known about the clinical course or disease severity of these patients.Our objective was to describe the clinical characteristics and disease course of lung disease among patients with IBD seen at our Institution. METHODS:We performed a retrospective cohort study of IBD patients at the University of Florida between 2012 and 2019.We included patients with biopsy proven diagnosis of IBD or by consensus from our gastroenterology department.We collected demographic, clinical, physiological, and radiographic information.RESULTS: 319 patients were included in the analysis.75% of patients had a pulmonary abnormality either on pulmonary functions tests or chest imaging.The most frequent comorbidity was smoking related lung disease.6% had parenchymal lung disease, 8% had airway disease, 16% had pulmonary nodules, 17% pulmonary vascular disease (including pulmonary hypertension and pulmonary embolism), and 28% had other pulmonary manifestations.CONCLUSIONS: Pulmonary manifestations of IBD are increasingly recognized.We present a large cohort characterizing the pulmonary manifestations among IBD patients and their clinical course.CLINICAL IMPLICATIONS: Larger studies are needed to provide information on the prevalence and clinical progression of pulmonary disease in the IBD population.Further work to identify therapeutic options for this group is needed.