Long-term outcome after ileal pouch-anal anastomosis: function and health-related quality of life.

ABSTRACT

PURPOSE: This study was designed to investigate long-term pouch function and health-related quality of life in a single, large cohort of patients with ileal pouch-anal anastomosis for ulcerative colitis. METHODS: Data from 370 patients were included in the study. Thirty-nine patients (11 percent) did not have a functioning pouch (failures) but were included in the health-related quality of life analyses. Pouch function (Oresland score) and health-related quality of life (Short Form-36) were evaluated by postal questionnaires. A total of 88 percent of the patients with a functioning ileal pouch-anal anastomosis returned the questionnaires vs. 76 percent of the failures. Median follow-up time after ileal pouch-anal anastomosis was 15 years vs. 11 years after failure. An age-matched and gender-matched reference sample (n = 286) was randomly drawn from the Swedish Short Form-36 database. RESULTS: Median bowel frequency was six per 24 hours 76 percent emptied the reservoir at night, 23 percent had urgency, 12 percent had evacuation difficulties, and 17 percent experienced soiling during the day. Fifty-two percent of the males and 32 percent of the females suffered from soiling at night. More than one-half of the patients had occasional perianal soreness, 6 percent considered the pouch to be a social handicap, and 94 percent were satisfied with their pouch. Patients with a functioning ileal pouch-anal anastomosis did not differ from the reference sample on any Short Form-36 domain, except for a reduced score in General Health (P = 0.02). Pouch function was positively correlated to health-related quality of life. Patients with pouch failure had reduced health-related quality of life in most domains. CONCLUSIONS: Patients' satisfaction is high and functional outcome is good after ileal pouch-anal anastomosis. Poor pouch function affects health-related quality of life negatively. Patients with failure after ileal pouch-anal anastomosis are substantially limited in a variety of health-related quality of life domains.