Member-only story
Numbers of Canadians With Crohn’s and Colitis on the Rise, Wake-Up Call to Healthcare System
There are only 36.71 million people in Canada, and 270,000 of them are living with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD). By the year 2030, that number is expected to rise to around 403,000.
Crohn’s and Colitis Canada has just released its “2018 Impact of Inflammatory Bowel Disease in Canada” report, which stands as a wake-up call for Canada’s healthcare system.
Canada has one of the highest rates of IBD in the world, and the prevalence of Crohn’s and ulcerative colitis (the two main forms of IBD) in Canadian children alone has risen nearly 50 percent over the past decade.
Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) covers a handful of disorders that involve inflammation of the intestines, though Crohn’s disease can cause inflammation along any part of the gastrointestinal tract. Symptoms of both Crohn’s and ulcerative colitis include diarrhea, reduced appetite and weight loss, fatigue, fever, and abdominal pain. In some instances, IBD can be life threatening. With IBD the body has trouble digesting food, absorbing nutrients from food, and eliminating waste products properly.
While IBD can be diagnosed at any age, it is typically diagnosed during adolescence or young adulthood. This is a time, authors of the 2018 report said…
