Prognosis of patients with nonmalignant chronic intestinal failure receiving long-term home parenteral nutrition.

BACKGROUND/AIMS: Long-term survival of patients with intestinal failure requiring home parenteral nutrition (HPN) has been only partly shown. Therefore, we described the survival of these patients and explored prognosis factors.

METHODS: Two hundred seventeen noncancer non-acquired immunodeficiency syndrome adult patients presenting with chronic intestinal failure enrolled from January 1980 to December 1989 in approved HPN programs in Belgium and France; prognosis factors of survival were explored using multivariate analysis. Data were updated in March 1991; not one of the patients was lost to follow-up.

RESULTS: Seventy-three patients died during the survey, and the mortality rate related to HPN complications accounted for 11% of deaths. Probabilities of survival at 1, 3, and 5 years were 91%, 70%, and 62%, respectively. Three independent variables were associated with a decreased risk of death: age of patients younger than 40 years, start of HPN after 1987, and absence of chronic intestinal obstruction. In patients younger than 60 years of age included after 1983 with a very short bowel, who could represent suitable candidates for small bowel transplantation, the 2-year survival rate was 90%, a prognosis that compared favorably with recent reports of survival after small bowel transplantation.

CONCLUSIONS: HPN prognosis compares favorably with recent reports of survival after small bowel transplantation.