The Clinical Course of Bowel Urgency Severity Among Patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease—A Real-World Study

Bowel urgency is a highly burdensome symptom among patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). To assess changes in severity of bowel urgency and identify predictors of worsening or improvement among patients with Crohn’s disease (CD) and ulcerative colitis (UC) at 6 months from their enrollment visit. Data from patients in the Study of a Prospective Adult Research Cohort with IBD were analyzed. Enrolled patients with CD or UC with 6-month visits were included. Changes and predictors of bowel urgency severity over 6 months in patients with CD or UC were examined using two separate analyses: (a) “worsening” versus “no change” excluding those with moderate-to-severe bowel urgency at enrollment, and (b) “improvement” versus “no change” excluding those with no bowel urgency at enrollment. The enrollment characteristics were compared within these groups. At baseline, in both CD and UC, use of biologics and/or immunomodulators at enrollment was similar across cohorts. Among patients with CD, 206 of 582 (35.4