Crohn’s disease patients often suffer recurrence after surgery in a relatively short time.
Hence, prevention of such complication is an important management consideration.
Conventional medical therapies such as antibiotics, mesalamine, and thiopurines
have shown little if any benefit for this indication. Recent promising data have shown
that postoperative recurrence can be prevented in between 90 and 100% of patients
when anti-TNFs are given immediately after surgery. Ongoing randomized clinical
trials are now seeking to confirm these findings on a larger scale. This review will
focus on the published studies that have used anti-TNFs to prevent postoperative
recurrence, outline possible long-term strategies for these patients and review the
potential implications of these data.
