The prevalence of the inflammatory bowel diseases (IBD), consisting of Crohn’s disease and ulcerative colitis, now exceeds 0.3% in North America, Europe, and Oceania, and has been reported as high as 0.7% in some nations within those regions. Conversely, in newly industrialized countries in South America, the Middle East, and Asia, both the incidence and prevalence of IBD is rapidly rising. Following the advent of biologics, many countries report trends of decreasing hospitalizations per IBD patient, but, even with modern methods of treatment, it is not clear if reduced hospitalizations per patient translates to an overall reduction in population-level hospitalizations.