Some people compare inflammatory bowel disease (including Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis) to “green cancer” because more than 90% of it is not fatal, but difficult to cure. Inflammatory bowel disease is “difficult to cure” and is also associated with “cancer”, which makes many patients panic and even feel desperate. But in fact, inflammatory bowel disease is a chronic disease, just like diabetes and hypertension, except that it requires close long-term management. In the May 19 World Inflammatory Bowel Disease Day at the Sixth Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University, Professor Gao Xiang, Director of the Department of Gastroenterology, told Guangdong Station reporters that inflammatory bowel disease, as long as actively standardized treatment and regular close follow-up, patients can live, study, work and play like normal people, it is not as scary as the imaginary “green cancer It is not as scary as the imagined “green cancer”. Patients should first have a proper understanding of the disease, should know what the disease is all about and know how to manage it with their doctors, because inflammatory bowel disease has a long course and is prone to recurrent attacks, causing digestive disorders, and can also be followed by serious complications such as fistulas, abdominal abscesses, intestinal strictures and obstructions, gastrointestinal hemorrhage, acute perforations, and even cancer. ”Especially the more you ignore it (don’t manage it), the faster the disease may progress and the greater the chance of intestinal stricture and intestinal perforation,” emphasized Director Gao. On the contrary, when we have been very attentive to managing it, following up well, adjusting medication in a timely manner when inflammatory activity is detected, and restoring remission or maintaining remission as soon as possible, the patient’s symptoms will be reduced, the chance of complications will be reduced, and the overall quality of life will be improved. When inflammatory bowel disease has inflammatory activity, biologics can quickly control inflammatory activity and accelerate remission, but good medicine is never a panacea. Director Gao pointed out that “there are also about 40% of patients with biologics ineffective or ineffective, and there are also some patients who will gradually develop drug resistance in the process of using them”. What should we do at this point? Director Gao’s answer is that “traditional treatment methods can still be used: hormones + immunosuppressants, some patients can still get control and remission, but the proportion is relatively small. In fact, biologics are not the first choice for all inflammatory bowel diseases. “There are both disease and national considerations,” says Director Gao. Biological agents are more expensive and are not reimbursed by medical insurance, so a course of treatment will cost 60,000 to 70,000, which is difficult for many patients to afford; at the same time, some patients’ conditions are relatively mild, and killing a pig does not necessarily require a slaughtering knife, otherwise it is a waste of medical resources. Director Gao Xiang believes that biologics should be used at key points, for example, some patients need to prepare for college exams or have children, and need to control the disease relatively quickly, so you can consider using biologics first; on the contrary, if the disease is relatively mild, and no other special circumstances, you can first use other drugs to treat, if other drugs are not effective, then consider biologics is not too late. Moreover, biological agents are not used for a long time, and after the disease is controlled and in remission, the treatment can be changed to immunosuppressants or other drugs to maintain the remission. Therefore, in inflammatory bowel disease, it is important to adjust medications according to the condition, and because of this, patients need to be actively followed up on a regular basis. Regular follow-up visits can detect the recurrence of inflammation in time for early management. As you can see, “regular follow-up is as important as medication,” emphasizes Director Gao. Usually, in the active phase of inflammatory bowel disease, patients need to follow up once a week or two or once a month (depending on the specific condition), to draw blood to recheck the indicators of inflammation, liver function, white blood cell levels, etc., to understand the effect of medication and side effects, the follow-up will be more intensive; when the condition is more stable after a period of medication, then the follow-up can be once every 3 months, and in these follow-ups, sometimes need to check In these follow-ups, sometimes it is necessary to check the colonoscopy or imaging (CT or MR) to understand the recovery of the disease, for example, to see how the intestinal mucosa heals, and so on.