The following is a summary of “Feeding Tube Placement, Complications, and Treatment Responses in a Large Eosinophilic Esophagitis Patient Population,” published in the December 2023  issue of Pediatrics by Borinsky, et al.

Feeding tubes can be used for nutritional treatments for a short or long time. Not much is known about how food tubes can help people with eosinophilic esophagitis (EoE). For a study, researchers sought to explain the traits and results of EoE patients who needed to be fed through a tube. The cohort study looked back at EoE patients at a big primary care health center. From medical records, demographics, clinical features, and endoscopy results were taken out, and patients who had a feeding tube were found. It was looked at patients with and without a feeding tube. 

Information was gathered about the tube, any problems, and the treatment. They compared the babies’ growth, symptoms, and histopathologic (<15 eos/hpf) changes before and after they started feeding tube treatment. They found 39 of the 1,216 EoE patients who had a feeding tube, which is 3%. Patients who had a feeding tube were younger (mean age 6.3 years), vomited more, and had a lower total endoscopic reference score than patients who did not have a feeding tube (P < 0.01 for all). 

On average, tubes were used for therapy for 6.8 years, and 95% of patients with EoE got both drug treatment and formula treatment. 26% of people who had a tube problem had to go to the emergency room. Body mass index z score (P < 0.01), clinical response (42%), endoscopy response (53%), and histology response (71%) all got better with tube feeding. Only a small group of EoE patients needed a feeding tube; most were young children who were not growing properly. Feeding tubes helped the child grow a lot, and when used with other treatments, they lowered the inflammation in the esophagus.

Source: journals.lww.com/jpgn/abstract/2023/12000/feeding_tube_placement,_complications,_and.16.aspx