The Role of Biomarkers in Clinical Trials of Inflammatory Bowel Disease

Clinical trials require valid outcome measures to assess the therapeutic benefit of investigational agents. Recently, regulatory authorities have mandated the use of patient-reported outcomes in combination with an objective measure of disease activity as primary outcome measures in inflammatory bowel disease trials. Endoscopy has commonly fulfilled the latter role; however, due to the costs and complexity of these assessments, interest has emerged in the use of noninvasive biomarkers. The role of C-reactive protein, fecal calprotectin, and fecal lactoferrin in clinical research is discussed.