Challenges in IBD Research 2024: Pragmatic Clinical Research.

ABSTRACT

Pragmatic clinical research is 1 of the 5 focus areas of the Challenges in IBD Research 2024, a multidisciplinary effort by scientists, clinicians, patients, and funders to identify priorities for patient-centric research. This summary provides a comprehensive overview of current gaps in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) clinical research and actionable approaches to address them. This review is focused on identifying research that is needed to achieve the best outcomes for patients in clinical practice. Research gaps include understanding the needs of understudied patient groups and addressing barriers to care so all patients receive optimal care, validating and using biomarkers to enable early diagnosis and result in better outcomes for adults and children with IBD, and determining the optimal sequencing of treatments (medical, surgical, adjunct) in children and adults. Inclusive pragmatic research is needed to address these gaps and lead to improvements in patient care and outcomes for all populations of patients with IBD.

Pragmatic clinical research focuses on improving evidence for how to best treat patients to improve quality of life and disease outcomes in real-world practice. This includes evaluating and improving healthcare delivery and decreasing barriers for all patients.