JPGN Journal Club: August 2023

Dr Alex Knisely today is speaking with Dr Andreas Jenke – it’s Journal Club again. Dr Jenke has chosen from the August, 2023, number of JPGN three articles for discussion – from Brisbane (Queensland), Australia, and, in India, Lucknow, Jodhpur, and Rishikesh (a thousand-kilometre span across the centre and north of the subcontinent ! ), Oral Tacrolimus in Steroid-Refractory and - Dependent Pediatric Ulcerative Colitis - a Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis ; from a group in San Diego, California, with contributions from a group at Columbia University in New York City, An Open Label, Randomized, Multicenter Study of Elafibranor in Children with Nonalcoholic Steatohepatitis ; and from Edmonton (Alberta), Canada, Clinical Features of Children with Serology-Negative, Biopsy-Positive Celiac Disease. The Indian / Australian study is a meta-analysis and review rather than primary work ; it concludes that tacrolimus may allow caregivers to temporise, with an initially good response that rather rapidly tails off, and that it may be less effective in the steroid-refractory child. The elafibranor study holds out promise – but that promise is based on findings in only a few children and adolescents. (The study was ended early, with enrolment curtailed when drug- company sponsorship was withdrawn after elafibranor failed to meet expectations in adult patients.) Does seronegative coeliac disease differ clinically from seropositive coeliac disease ? Well, maybe. Hypogammaglobulinaemia A is more frequent in the former, albeit not universally found. But overall no particular feature, no single clinical-laboratory biomarker, emerged as both sensitive and specific for either form of coeliac disease : The search continues.