Disability and quality of life before and during the COVID-19 outbreak: A cross-sectional study in inflammatory bowel disease patients

Background/Aim: Inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is a chronic disorder affecting patients' health-related quality of life (HRQoL) which adds to their disability. Little is known about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on HRQoL of IBD patients. We aimed to evaluate HRQoL in IBD patient's pre- and post-COVID-19 pandemic using the IBD-disk questionnaire and explore associations between socio demographic factors, disease types, severity and impaired HRQoL in patients with IBD. Patients and Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted at a tertiary care centre in Saudi Arabia between November 2019 and March 2020 at the outpatient IBD clinics. The HRQoL of patients was assessed using the 10-item IBD-disk questionnaire. Results: A total of 59 IBD patients (40 Crohn's disease, 19 Ulcerative colitis) with a mean disease duration of 3.5 years were included. Most of the patients (77.97%) were on biologics while 35.59% were on immune modulators, 16.94% on 5-ASA, and 3.38% were on corticosteroids. There was no difference between any of the 10 IBD-disk variables pre and post-COVID-19 pandemic apart from the perception of body image, where there was a slightly more negative perception with an increase from 2.53 to 3.39 (P = 0.05) There was no significant difference in HRQoL between patients with ulcerative colitis and Crohn's disease in any of domains. Conclusion: The current study showed that disability and HRQoL appears to be unaffected by the COVID-19 pandemic among our cohort, however further studies with longer follow up and larger sample size is needed.