Enteral Nutrition and Remicade

[ilinguiti]

Anyone have experience or knowledge on weaning off/spacing out remicade infusions using enteral nutrition? I am maxed out on my Remicade dose. I get 10mg/kg every 4 weeks. In order to avoid building up antibodies more quickly I would like to be able to go longer between infusions and then hopefully decrease the dose. I am in remission right now thanks to Remicade so I really want to continue to be able to use it for a long time but I also know that I can't space it out any further right now without getting sick, so I was wondering if there might be a potential for EN to help.

 

[Tesscorm]

I don't know about spacing out remicade infusions, however, I did read a report that showed greater success with remicade with EN was incorporated. Link to report is below. FWIW, my son did exclusive EN to induce remission, continued with supplemental EN as his treatment for almost two years and then added remicade (due to continued inflammation). Since remicade, he continues to drink one to two Boost shakes every day. I don't know if it's helping but, at the very least, it provides added nutrition to help his body do it's job as best as it can.

Effectiveness of concomitant enteral nutrition therapy and infliximab for maintenance treatment of Crohn's disease in adults.


http://www.crohnsforum.com/showthread.php?t=55580

 

[ilinguiti]

Thank you so much! This article is so helpful. I am definitely going to talk to my GI doctor about this. I had added Remicade to EN because we couldn't get my Crohn's under control. Once Remicade started helping we dropped of on the EN but given what this article shows I definitely want to see if it could help prolong this period of feeling well!

 

[Tesscorm]

Good luck! I'd be curious to know what your GI thinks??? My son's GI isn't very supportive of EN - doesn't think it does harm but doesn't think it helps either??