Early Surgery versus optimal Current step-up prActice for chronic PancrEatitis (ESCAPE)

The primary clinical outcome is the degree of pain as assessed by the Izbicki pain score at 2 weeks intervals during the follow-up period of 18 months

1. Cost-effectiveness, total direct and indirect costs-during 18 months follow-up period
2. Severe complications related to disease progression or endoscopic and surgical interventions
2.1. Mortality (all-cause)
2.2. Disease progression: development of pseudocysts, pancreatic insufficiency (endocrine or exocrine), gastric outlet or duodenal obstruction, chronic use of opioids (defined as need for opioids for a period > 6 months), hospital admissions for CP upflares
2.3. Endoscopic intervention: (acute) pancreatitis flare up, cholangitis, acute cholecystitis, retroperitioneal or bowel perforation, abdominal sepsis, intra-abdominal abscesses needing intervention, bleeding needing transfusion or intervention, any relaparotomy for other reasons
2.4. Surgical intervention: anastomotic leakage, bleeding needing transfusion or intervention, abdominal sepsis, intra-abdominal abscesses needing intervention, burst abdomen, severe wound infection (requiring prolonged hospital stay), any relaparotomy for other reasons
3. Quality of life-assessed by validated questionnaires.
4. Izbicki score at 18 months follow-up
5. Endocrine pancreatic insufficiency-determined by use of anti-diabetic medication or abnormal serum glucose levels (fasting serum glucose levels > 6,0 mmol/L in capillary blood or > 6,9 mmol/L in venous plasma at two different days
6. Exocrine pancreatic insufficiency-determined by fecal elastase levels (< 200µg/g)
7. Additional pain measurements-due to the heterogeneity in reporting of pain in previous trials and in order for the results of this trial to be comparable with other important trials in literature, the following additional measures of pain will be reported as well:
7.1. Proportion of patients with complete and partial pain relief at end of follow-up, defined as follows:
7.1.1. Complete pain relief: an Izbicki pain score = 10 points
7.1.2. Partial pain relief: a decrease of >50% from baseline in the Izbicki score with a final score >10 points
7.2. Visual analogue score (VAS) for pain: measured as part of the Izbicki score
7.3. Büchler pain score: alternative pain measure based on the Izbicki questionnaire, and calculated by the multiplication of two of the four items of the Izbicki questionnaire (i.e. pain frequency and pain intensity)
8. Number and duration of hospital admissions during study period-Total number of hospital admission during 18 months of follow-up period and days outside the hospital in 18 months of follow-up
9. Number of performed interventions-total number of endoscopic and surgical interventions, including initial intervention.
10. Number of pancreatitis flare ups during study period-total number during 18 months follow-up period documented by computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)