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Las Vegas,
NV— In southern Ontario, the incidence of IBS following
acute infectious gastroenteritis is 3.7 per cent, according to a
study presented at the annual meeting of the American College of
Gastroenterology.
Previous studies in the literature reported incidences of 25 to
32 per cent, but in a cohort of 231 stool-culture-positive adults,
recruited by the public health departments of Hamilton-Wentworth,
Halton and Waterloo, there were just seven incident cases, according
to Rome I criteria.
“[Our finding] is substantially lower than numbers reported
in some previous studies, and we feel the reason for this is because
we looked at community subjects and because we were a lot more methodologically
rigorous to exclude premorbid or preinfectious IBS,” said Mark
R. Borgaonkar, MD, Assistant Professor, Gastroenterology, Memorial
University, St. John’s, NF.
The patients were mostly female, Caucasian, mean age of 42 years,
and most had postsecondary education. None had previously diagnosed
IBS, and none had organic GI disease.
During the gastroenteritis, most of the patients experienced diarrhea
and abdominal pain; three-quarters had weight loss. More than half
of the patients reported fever, 12 per cent required hospital admission,
and 41 per cent received antibiotics.
The duration of symptoms was approximately 12 days, and the mean
time to full recovery was 12.5 days. Patients averaged two visits
each to a physician.
“With respect to potential predictors for developing postinfectious
IBS, the only thing that emerged as statistically significant was
the presence of fever during the gastroenteritis, with an odds ratio
of 12,” Dr. Borgaonkar said.
Campylobacter infection accounted for half of all GE cases, Giardia
26 per cent, and Salmonella 15 per cent.
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