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Complications of Crohn’s disease are variable. There are complications such as nutritional deficiencies because patients with Crohn’s disease have inflammation of the digestive tract. They may have vitamin deficiencies, nutritional deficiencies. Those are very important to make sure that they’re dealt with. Patients with Crohn’s disease should be on multivitamins, their nutrient levels should be checked by their physician regularly, and replenished. Other complications of Crohn’s disease include blockages, so intestinal blockages, we call them strictures. And those are very serious and those need to be dealt with. If there’s active inflammation still, we are able to relieve the obstruction with immunosuppressants and patients do not require surgery. But occasionally if they’ve had inflammation for a very, very long time, then those strictures are what we call fibrotic, they’re basically scarred. Sometimes surgery is necessary to remove that area so that patients can move on with their treatment. Infections are another potential complication. If patients develop an abscess, which is basically a collection of bacteria or puss as a result of a Fistula, which is an abnormal connection between bowels of intestine that result from inflammation. That needs to be addressed with antibiotics, sometimes surgical drainage, where we relieve the abscess surgically. Those are the main complications of Crohn’s disease.
