Genetics of ulcerative colitis drugs

Ulcerative colitis, or UC, is a bowel disease. Symptoms include cramps. Abdominal pain. Blood in your stool. And weight loss. It can make you feel weak and sick. UC may even lead to life-threatening problems. Symptoms develop over time. These include diarrhea. Abdominal pain. Cramps. Blood in your stool. Weight Loss. Feeling tired. Or fever. UC is a chronic condition. This means that once you have it, it does not go away. UC has no cure. But we do have drugs that can reduce the signs and symptoms. These drugs result in remission for most people. Remission is a temporary recovery. The signs and symptoms are gone, or almost gone. But the problem can still come back. In more than half the people that take UC drugs, the symptoms come back. In some people, the drugs never work. We do not have a good way to tell for whom the UC drugs will work. Or whose UC will come back. Scientists at Vanderbilt University Medical Center think that gene changes could give us clues. The researchers will use BioVU to study UC. They will look for patients with UC who take drugs to control their symptoms. Then they will check for gene changes. They think there is a link between gene changes and UC that comes back. And gene changes and people for whom UC drugs do not work. Their results may help us learn more about UC. For whom UC drugs will work well. Who may relapse. And for whom they will not work at all. The results may help us find new drugs to treat UC patients. The goal is to know which UC drug will work best for each patient.