Inflammatory bowel disease in children: Indian perspective.

The magnitude of inflammatory bowel disease in childhood in India is largely unknown. At the Pediatric Gastroenterology section of PGIMER, Chandigarh, 15 out of 294 children (5%) admitted for colonic disorders were diagnosed to have ulcerative colitis. Diagnosis is suspected on the basis of clinical presentation and established by sigmoidoscopy, rectal biopsy and double contrast barium enema. Widely prevalent bacillary dysentery, acute amoebic colitis and antibiotic induced colitis need to be kept in differential diagnosis of acute presentation of ulcerative colitis. Chronic or recurrent colitis needs to be differentiated from tuberculous colitis. Inflammatory bowel disease deserves clinical suspicion in all unusual cases of colitis which do not respond to treatment of common infective agents.