Infliximab treatment for Crohn's disease: One‐year experience in a Dutch Academic Hospital

The aim of this study was to report the 1‐year clinical experience with infliximab treatment for Crohn's disease (CD) in the Netherlands. All 73 CD patients receiving infliximab infusions were prospectively followed during 1 year after the drugs' registration in the Netherlands. Clinical response and adverse events were assessed for both active luminal disease as well as fistulous disease. A total of 212 infusions were administered to 57 patients with active luminal CD and 16 patients with fistulous CD. The mean duration between infusions was 60 days. In 17% of patients, adverse events were recorded, of which one was serious. The response rate was 81% in active luminal CD and 87% in fistulous disease. Response rates were highest in patients receiving concomitant methotrexate as maintenance therapy. Steroids could successfully be tapered off in 73% of responding luminal CD patients and 100% of responding CD patients with fistulae. Eleven patients showed a loss of response to continuous infliximab readministration. Our clinical experience with infliximab for active luminal and fistulous CD showed that the administration is safe, effective, and has high steroid‐sparing efficacy. Higher response rates were seen with methotrexate as concomitant medication.