Crohn's disease is sometimes called regional enteritis. There may be inflammation of any part of the gastrointestinal tract from mouth to anus. Commonly affected areas are the terminal ileum, colon and anorectal regions. Clinical features include chronic diarrhea, abdominal pain, fever, anorexia and weight loss. Crohn's disease is most often diagnosed between the ages of 20- 40. There is an increased risk of colon cancer if the disease has been present over 15 years. Treatment is similar to that of ulcerative colitis. However, over half of Crohn's patients will need some surgical intervention within 5 years. Because the entire gastrointestinal tract can be involved, surgery is not curative and recurrences following surgery are common.
Crohn's disease requiring daily steroid use requires addition of one table to any rating. Crohn's disease with frequent flares or with disabling diarrhea is rated Class F to decline irrespective of age. Continuous debilitating symptoms despite medication (including repeated hospitalization and/or surgery, weight loss and intravenous hyperalimentation/l. V nutrition) would be a decline.
Life Insurance Solutions, in summary when underwriting a Crohn's disease history, suggests for those persons looking for life insurance for Crohn's disease, the following factors are very important in assessing the risk:
- name of condition?
- age of diagnosis/date of diagnosis?
- date of last attack?
- description of symptoms (e.g. abdominal pain, diarrhea, bleeding?)
- medications taken?
- dates of hospitalization?
- dates of surgery, if any?
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