Home-grown hope for people with ulcerative colitis

Home-grown hope for people with ulcerative colitisPeople living with ulcerative colitis now have hope for a treatment when others have failed, thanks to decades of research led by Dr. Brian Feagan, BSc’77, MD’83, and initiated by the late Dr. Andrew Lazarovits. Dr. Feagan serves as professor in the Departments of Medicine, and Epidemiology and Biostatistics, and the CEO of Robarts Clinical Trials at Robarts Research Institute.

Dr. Feagan led the international clinical trials and was lead author on the trial results published in The New England Journal of Medicine in 2013.

Ulcerative colitis, one of the two most common types of inflammatory bowel disease, is a potentially debilitating condition that affects more than 125,000 Canadians. Health Canada recently approved the use of Entyvio (vedolizumab), a medication that targets over-active immune cells in the gut without suppressing the entire immune system.