Dr. Colombel began his career at Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Lille, France in 1980, where he was Professor of Hepatogastroenterology from 1991 and Head of the Department of Gastroenterology from 2010 to 2012. Since 1984, his research has focused on Inflammatory Bowel Diseases (IBD). Thanks to the development of multiple local, national, and international collaborations, he has been able to contribute to important advances in the pathophysiology of IBD. The most remarkable was the initiation in 1994 of collection and sampling of IBD families that eventually led to the identification of NOD2 as a susceptibility gene for Crohn’s disease (CD); the development in the 90’s of the ASCA test (anti-S.cerevisiae antibodies) which is still the most sensitive and specific serologic marker for CD and elucidation of the potential role of Candida albicans in CD; and the identification of a new pathovar of Escherichia coli (AIEC for adhesive invasive E.coli) associated with ileal CD. From a clinical perspective, over the last 20 years, he has been involved in most of the clinical trials that have helped to develop new drugs, especially biologics, and to improve therapeutic strategies in IBD.
In January 2013, he was appointed as the director of the Susan and Leonard Feinstein Inflammatory Bowel Disease Clinical Center, where he and his colleagues have built an “IBD Home” — a place where patients can benefit from the most advanced and coordinated care, including access to IBD specialists, surgeons, psychologists, nutritionists, pharmacists, social workers and affiliated health professionals.
Since he arrived at Mount Sinai, he has coordinated research efforts to ensure integration and productivity by developing collaborative research projects with colleagues in multiple disciplines from across Mount Sinai, including immunology, microbiology, genetic and genomic sciences, creating an innovative public-private consortium with industry, academic, and governmental partners implementing major clinical trials with the potential to significantly improve treatment for patients across the spectrum of the disease—those who are newly diagnosed and those in advanced stages—promoting the launch of a New York City-wide association of IBD researchers and clinicians (NYCCO) and establishing partnerships and consortia with Europe’s leading IBD organizations and institutions with the most recent goal to predict and potentially prevent the development of IBD.
The main concretization of this work has been the publication as primary author or co-author of more than 965 peer-reviewed papers, most of them in the domain of IBD, which made him one of the most published gastroenterologists in the world. He has been an associate editor of major gastroenterology journals, including Gut, Alimentary Pharmacology and Therapeutics, and Gastroenterology (current).
He has trained several generations of fellows both in the US and in Europe, many of them becoming key opinion leaders in IBD in their country. This leadership in IBD has been recognized by his friends, peers, and colleagues, who elected him as the president of the European Crohn’s and Colitis Organization (ECCO) (2008-2010) and chair of the International Organization of Inflammatory Bowel Disease (IOIBD) (2010-2012). He was awarded the United European Gastroenterology Federation Research Prize in 2009 and the Crohn’s and Colitis Foundation of America (CCFA) Clinical Research Award in 2014.
In 2018, he received the Sherman Prize for Excellence in Crohn’s and Colitis for exceptional and pioneering achievements.
