Master in Intestinal Ultrasound in Inflammatory Bowel Disease A.Y. 2024/2025

The II level Master in “Intestinal Ultrasound in Inflammatory Bowel Disease” aims to provide and strengthen the competencies concearning the use and indications of ultrasound in the diagnosis and treatment of the IBDs.

Bowel Ultrasound procedures have peculiar features that make these techniques unique among the diagnostic tools for IBD.

In fact, the intestinal ultrasound is a non-invasive imaging method, that doesn’t use contrast media by mouth or intravenously except in extremely selected cases; it can be performed in real time (Point of the care of ultrasound, POCUS) allowing to speed up the medical decision-making process; it is comfortable for patients, making it a frequently repeatable and extremely strategic method in the era of "Treat-to-target" and "Tight control"; it also has a diagnostic accuracy comparable to that of more invasive and expensive imaging methods such as magnetic enteroresonance and enteroTC. Moreover, the development of ultrasound scores for the activity and severity of IBD make it an accurate and reliable alternative to colonoscopy, which therefore today sees its field of use limited to particular situations in which it is necessary to perform a biopsy sampling.

Students will become aware of the increasing use of bowel ultrasound during outpatient visits, providing information about the presence, activity and severity of the disease; response to treatment; developement of any penetrating and/or stenosing complications requiring a surgical approach. 

The training course requires, on the one hand, adequate knowledge of the ultrasound anatomy of the gastrointestinal tract and in particular the small and large intestine, and on the other hand, the development of technical skills.
The course aims to provide the participant with adequate knowledge regarding the devices and technique of ultrasound of the intestinal loops, as well as the ability to evaluate indications and know the results.

The expected didactic results, to be verified throughout the training and the final project, consist of:
- the acquisition of the ultrasound anatomy (normal and pathological) of the small and large intestine;
- the theoretical and practical acquisition of ultrasound techniques of intestinal loops;
- the acquisition of the up-to-date indications and results of BU procedures, in order to promote a non-invasive approach for the diagnosis and follow-up of IBDs.