Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis are chronic inflammatory bowel diseases that can occur at any age. Due to the chronic course with an unpredictable sequence of relapses and remission phases and a multitude of possible complications, they significantly impair the psychosocial development and quality of life of those affected. There is a relevant comorbidity, especially with mood disorders. Interactions of psychologically stressful situations with inflammatory activity are suspected, but have not yet been sufficiently proven.

In a previous Cochrane Review, we summarized the evidence on the effectiveness of psychological interventions on quality of life in people with IBD. We considered psychotherapeutic procedures as well as patient education and relaxation techniques. The review was first published in 2011.

This work is currently being fundamentally revised and supplemented as part of a renewed BMBF grant. A multicomponent network meta-analysis will now additionally be applied. This takes into account the considerable heterogeneity of the mostly multimodular interventions.

The study is conducted in cooperation with the IMBI in Freiburg (Dr. Gerta Rücker). In addition, Professor Moser (AKH Vienna) is involved as an expert.

• Timmer A, Preiss JC, Motschall E, Rücker G, Jantschek G, Moser G. Psychological interventions for treatment of inflammatory bowel disease. Cochrane Database Syst Rev. 2011 Feb 16; (2).