Clinical outcomes of long-term infliximab treatment for 15 years in patients with Crohn’s disease: a retrospective study

While clinical trials have demonstrated that approximately 50% of patients with Crohn’s disease (CD) maintain clinical remission at 1 year with infliximab (IFX), the outcomes of long-term IFX treatment in CD are still under scrutiny. This retrospective cohort study analyzed 113 patients with CD from September 2010 to July 2025 to evaluate adherence and clinical remission rates, as well as to identify factors associated with treatment adherence. The median duration of IFX treatment was 61.7 months. At the 72-month follow-up (M72), patients were categorized into M72-remission (44.2%) and M72-non-remission (55.8%) groups. The M72-remission group had a significantly higher baseline Crohn’s disease activity index score than the M72-non-remission group (p = 0.003). However, this difference was no longer significant at the 72-month follow-up (p = 0.254). At the final follow-up, 67.3% of patients continued to receive IFX treatment. Both the adherence rate to IFX (p = 0.012) and the clinical remission rate (p = 0.030) were significantly higher in patients with no surgery compared to those with surgery prior to IFX treatment. Early clinical remission was not associated with the adherence to IFX treatment. Previous surgery may be an independent risk factor for long-term IFX treatment failure. Infliximab (IFX), a first-line treatment for patients with Crohn’s disease, showed moderate effectiveness in achieving clinical and endoscopic remission in previous induction and maintenance trials. This study shows that 67.3% of patients continued IFX therapy and 70.8% maintained clinical remission at the end of follow-up, including one patient who received IFX for more than 175 months. These findings indicate that clinical remission, IFX trough levels, and levels of antibodies to infliximab during induction treatment were not associated with adherence to long-term IFX treatment. However, prior surgery, including intestinal or perianal surgery, may be an independent risk factor for long-term IFX treatment failure.