34 WORLD GASTROENTEROLOGY NEWS MAY 2016 Editorial | Expert Point of View | Gastro 2016: EGHS-WGO | WDHD News | WGO & WGOF News | WGO Global Guidelines | Calendar of Events incidence rates of UC and CD with higher incidences reported in urban Hong Kong compared to rural China8. One of the challenges of treatment of IBD is the relatively high cost of biological drugs which are increasingly used in the treatment of complicated and refractory IBD cases. A practical and reasonable approach to management has been described by the “cascades” approach as proposed by the WGO Guidelines Committee9. Chronic Hepatitis B infection is a very prevalent liver disease in the Asian Pacific region. More recent re-ports, however, indicate that NAFLD is slowly becoming a very common problem with the rise in diabetes mellitus and obesity and will soon become the most common cause of chronic liver disease in the region10. The prevalence of Hepatitis B infec-tion and related cirrhosis and cancer will also start to decline dramatically from 2020, with mass vaccination in many countries in Asia having being implemented from 1988. These emerging diseases in Asia Pacific reflect the change in lifestyle to a “Westernized” one. Many factors play a part in the emergence of these diseases. However, the putative factor for many of these diseases is likely the rising obesity in all the populations affected. The emphasis in health care is to improve our diagnosis of these diseases with respect to designing ap-propriate treatment strategies. In gen-eral, however, a program to manage obesity in a mass population approach may ultimately be most helpful and cost effective. The APAGE and the WGO play a crucial role in galvanizing the health care professionals and the public in facing new challenges ahead with these and other emerging diseases with respect to promoting awareness, health education, and training, as well as with guidance for optimal care of these diseases in the Asian Pacific region. References 1. Sung JJ, Lau JY, Goh KL, Leung WK; Asia Pacific Working Group on Colorectal Cancer. Increasing incidence of colorectal cancer in Asia: implications for screening. Lancet Oncol. 2005;6:871-6. 2. Goh LY, Leow AH, Goh KL.Observations on the epidemi-ology of gastrointestinal and liver cancers in the Asia-Pacific region. J Dig Dis. 2014 ;15:463-8. 3. Goh LY, Goh KL.Obesity: an epi-demiological perspective from Asia and its relationship to gastrointes-tinal and liver cancers. J Gastro-enterol Hepatol. 2013;28::54-8 (Suppl 4). 4. Schreuders EH, Ruco A, Rabeneck L, Schoen RE, Sung JJ, Young GP, Kuipers EJ. Colorectal can-cer screening: Global over-view of existing programmes. Gut. 2015;64:1637-49. 5. Goh KL. Gastroesophageal Reflux Disease in Asia: A historical perspec-tive and present challenges. Journal of Gastroenterology and Hepatology 2011; 26: 2–10 (Suppl 1). 6. Hunt R, Quigley E, Abbas Z, et al. World Gastroenterology Or-ganisation. Coping with common gastrointestinal symptoms in the community: a global perspective on heartburn, constipation, bloat-ing, and abdominal pain/discom-fort May 2013. J Clin Gastroen-terol. 2014;48:567-78. 7. Ng SC. Emerging leadership lec-ture: Inflammatory bowel disease in Asia: emergence of a “Western” disease. J Gastroenterol Hepa-tol 2015;30:440-5. 8. Ng SC, Tang W, Ching JY, et al. Incidence and phenotype of inflammatory bowel disease based on results from the Asia-pacific Crohn’s and colitis epidemiology study. Asia–Pacific Crohn’s and Colitis Epidemiologic Study (AC-CESS) Study Group. Gastroenter-ology. 2013 ;145:158-165. 9. Bernstein CN, Eliakhim A, Fedail S, et al. WGO Practice Guidelines- Inflammatory Bowel Disease. Available at http://www. worldgastroenterology.org/guide-lines/ global-guidelines/inflamma-tory- bowel-disease-ibd. 10. Chan WK, Goh KL. Epidemiol-ogy of a fast emerging disease in the Asia-Pacific region: non-alco-holic fatty liver disease. Hepatol Int 2013; 7:65–71.
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