Original article
Inflammatory bowel disease is associated with hidradenitis suppurativa: Results from a multicenter cross-sectional study

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jaad.2016.08.031Get rights and content

Background

Hidradenitis suppurativa (HS) is often associated with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD; Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis). However, the prevalence of IBD in HS patients is unknown.

Objective

To determine the prevalence of IBD in HS patients, and determine if patients with HS and IBD have a distinct HS phenotype.

Methods

For this multicenter, cross-sectional study, HS patients were asked during their first consultation if they had IBD. The diagnosis of IBD was checked in the medical files, and clinical characteristics were collected.

Results

IBD had a prevalence of 3.3% (95% CI 2.3-4.4) in 1076 HS patients. The prevalence of Crohn's disease was 2.5% (95% CI 1.6-3.4) and the prevalence of ulcerative colitis was 0.8% (95% CI 0.3-1.4). HS-IBD patients were less frequently obese (13.9% vs 31.2%, P = .04) than HS-only patients, but there were no differences in gender, family history of HS, disease severity, body areas affected by HS, or smoking status.

Limitations

The prevalence might be underestimated since HS patients might still develop IBD.

Conclusion

The prevalence of IBD in HS patients (3.3%) is 4-8 times higher than the prevalence in the general northern European population (0.41%-0.74%), however HS-IBD patients do not have a distinct HS phenotype.

Section snippets

Patients

For this multicenter, cross-sectional study, data were collected between 2007 and 2015 from HS patients who visited the Departments of Dermatology at Erasmus Medical Center Rotterdam, The Netherlands (ID, HZ, EP), Deventer Hospital, The Netherlands (JB), University Medical Center Groningen, The Netherlands (MK, BH), and Hôpital Erasme, Belgium (FB, VM). For this type of analysis, medical ethical committee approval is not required under Dutch law.

Data collection

During the initial consultation, HS patients were

Results

Data were collected from a total of 1076 HS patients, 324 males (30.1%) and 752 females (69.9%), with a mean age of 38.4 ± 12.7 years. Most patients had Hurley stage I (43.9%) or stage II (44.2%) and suffered from HS for a median period of 11.0 years (IQR: 5.0-21.0) (Table I).

Discussion

This multicenter cross-sectional study shows that 36 out of 1076 HS patients (3.3%) had IBD, resulting in a prevalence of 2.5% for CD and 0.8% for UC in HS patients. In comparison, the estimated prevalence of IBD in the general population in northern Europe ranges between 0.41% and 0.74%, with a prevalence of CD between 0.14% and 0.32% and a prevalence of UC between 0.24% and 0.41%.7, 8, 9, 10 These data indicate that the prevalence of IBD is 4-8 times higher in our HS cohort than in the

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    Drs Benhadou and Koldijk contributed equally to this work.

    Funding sources: None.

    Disclosure: B Horváth performed investigator-initiated studies of Janssen Cilag BV (The Netherlands) and AbbVie Inc; she received an unrestricted educational grant from AbbVie Netherlands (The Netherlands). Further, she has acted as a consultant for AbbVie and Janssen-Cilag. EP Prens has acted as a consultant for AbbVie, Amgen, Astra-Zeneca, Baxter, Eli Lilly, Idera, Galderma, Janssen-Cilag, Novartis, NTRC, and Pfizer and has received investigator-initiated research grants from Pfizer, Janssen-Cilag, and AbbVie. J Boer is on the advisory board of AbbVie Inc. F Benhadou has received honoraria from AbbVie Inc for participating in the advisory board. HH van der Zee has received honoraria from AbbVie Inc for participating in the advisory board.

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