Anti-adhesion Molecules in IBD: Does Gut Selectivity Really Make the Difference?

Inflammatory Bowel Disease is lifetime chronic progressive inflammatory disease. A considerable portion of patients, do not respond or lose response or experience side effect to "traditional" biological treatment such as anti-tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α agents. The concept that the blockade of T cell traffic to the gut controls inflammation has stimulated the development of new drugs which selectively targets molecules involved in controlling cell homing to the intestine. The result is the reduction of the chronic inflammatory infiltration in the gut. In this regard, anti-adhesion molecules represent a new class of drugs for patients who don't respond or lose response to traditional therapy. Moreover, some of these molecules such as vedolizumab, offer the advantage to target the delivery of a drug to the gut (gut selectivity) which could increase clinical efficacy and limit potential adverse events. In this article, we will give an overview of the current data on anti-adhesion molecules in Inflammatory Bowel Diseases.