Are faecal markers good indicators of mucosal healing in inflammatory bowel disease?

Table 5 Studies investigating the correlation between faecal lactoferrin concentrations and histologic activity in subjects with inflammatory bowel diseases

Ref.	Number of participants		Population	Histology index used	Histology indexcut off	Faecal lactoferrincut off(μg/mL)	Outcome measures				Correlation
	CD	UC					Sensitivity	Specificity	PPV	NPV	r value	P value
Crohn’s disease studies
Sipponen et al[18]	61		Adults	D'Haens (ileocolonic)		< 7.25	-	-	-	-	0.543	< 0.01
				D'Haens (ileal)		< 7.25	-	-	-	-	0.291	> 0.05
Sipponen et al[19]	15		Adult	D'Haens (pretreatment colonic)		< 10	-	-	-	-	0.482	0.069
				D'Haens (posttreatment colonic)		< 10	-	-	-	-	-	> 0.05
				D'Haens (ileal)		< 10	-	-	-	-	-	> 0.05
D'Incà et al[28]	31		Adult	Fazio			77%	80%	95%	-	0.477	0.009
Mixed inflammatory bowel disease studies
Vieira et al[30]	38	40	Adults	Unique score		4-8	90%	92%	96%	83%	-	-
D'Incà et al[28]	31	46	Adults	Fazio; Floren (SES-CD; Mayo)		7	76%	67%	90%	-	-	-
Ulcerative colitis studies
D'Incà et al[28]		46	Adults	Floren		7	75%	60%	87%	92%	0.544	0.0001

CD: Crohn’s disease; UC: Ulcerative colitis; PPV: Positive predictive value; NPV: Negative predictive value; SES-CD: Simple endoscopic score for Crohn’s disease[55]; Mayo: Mayo endoscopic sub-scoring of ulcerative colitis[57]; D’Haens: Non-standard histologic scoring system[66]; Fazio: Non-standard histologic scoring system[67]; Floren: Non-standard histologic scoring system[68].