Emerging Issues in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases [Hardcover]

This book contains the proceedings of Falk Symposium 151 on Emerging Issues in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases, held in Sydney, Australia, March 2006, the first symposium of its kind both in the southern hemisphere and in the Asia-Pacific region. This interdisciplinary symposium brings together basic science and clinical applications. It presents the first major text where East meets West in IBD.

Between the 1950s and 1980s, Europe and North America saw a marked increase in the incidence of Crohns disease in adults. The North--South divide in Europe disappeared and the incidence of paediatric Crohns disease has grown. We are now entering a new era, in which inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), especially Crohns disease, is emerging in the Asia--Pacific nations. The incidence patterns are mimicking those in Europe five decades ago.

This intriguing situation raises many questions. Is this a reflection of westernisation of countries in the Asia-Pacific? Can we take advantage of this situation to identify the environmental factors involved in pathogenesis, something we have largely failed to do the first time around? Will the lessons learnt in managing IBD in the past enable the emerging nations to better deal with these illnesses? Will IBD in the Asia--Pacific present behave and respond to therapies as the Western version or will different genetic and environmental backgrounds alter the phenotype of the diseases? Will it be safe to apply the same therapeutic approaches in an endemically infected environment?

This book is the proceedings of Falk Symposium 151 on Emerging Issues in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases, held in Sydney, Australia, on 24-25 March 2006, the first symposium of its kind both in the southern hemisphere and in the Asia--Pacific region. All contributors are leaders in their field of IBD across a wide spectrum of geographical regions and ethnicity.

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