Pediatric Patient and Parent Perceptions of Fecal Microbiota Transplantation for the Treatment of Ulcerative Colitis
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Fecal microbiota transplantation (FMT) has gained attention for its role in the treatment of ulcerative colitis (UC). Acceptance of this treatment, particularly among children and their parents, is an important aspect of assessing its feasibility for pediatric inflammatory bowel disease care. To date, no studies have assessed FMT acceptance among pediatric patients who underwent FMT treatment. Here, we explored the perceptions and experiences of FMT in a population of pediatric UC patients who participated in a recent FMT pilot randomized controlled trial. METHODS: Children who received bi-weekly FMT treatments for 6 weeks through a clinical trial (NCT02606032) and their parents participated in face-to-face, semi-structured interviews led by study investigators. Interviews were audiotaped, transcribed, and analyzed using validated qualitative research methods. RESULTS: Eight patients and eight parents were interviewed, with qualitative data summarized across four themes and 11 subthemes. The majority of participants perceived FMT as a "natural treatment" and cited lack of response to conventional medications and fear of medication side-effects as motivators for pursuing FMT. Pre-treatment, patients and parents expressed concerns regarding physical discomfort with FMT administration; post-treatment, most patients reported feeling "completely normal." Both patients and parents uniformly expressed interest in pursuing FMT again in the future if available. Convenience of medication therapies, and perceived naturality and efficacy of FMT were all endorsed. CONCLUSIONS: This is the first study to describe pediatric and parent experiences receiving FMT. This information is valuable to develop and encourage future FMT trials involving children. Pre-treatment, concerns about FMT were common. Post-treatment, patients reported tolerance to FMT and a desire to continue receiving this therapy if available. Further trials of FMT in UC are needed. Investigators should include pediatric patients without concern of acceptance.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame machine prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.
Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.004 | 0.013 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.002 | 0.001 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.001 | 0.001 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.001 |
| Research integrity | 0.001 | 0.002 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.002 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".