Recurrence of Venous Thromboembolism in Patients with Inflammatory Bowel Disease

Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is associated with excess risk for first-time venous thromboembolism (VTE), which usually occurs as deep venous thrombosis (DVT) of the extremities or pulmonary embolism (PE). However, little is known about the rate of VTE recurrence or the risk factors for VTE recurrence in IBD patients.

To examine this issue, investigators conducted a retrospective, multicenter study involving 116 IBD patients with a first PE or DVT who had discontinued anticoagulant therapy. First VTE was unprovoked (not related to trauma, surgery, or pregnancy) in 86 (74.1%) of the IBD patients. These patients were compared with a control group of 1225 first-time VTE patients without IBD.

The VTE recurrence rate among IBD patients was 30.2…