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Background & Aims: Inflammatory bowel diseases are still difficult to diagnose and differentiate in some cases despite the serological, imaging, endoscopic and histopathological armamentarium. Raman spectroscopy is a technique that could help with these shortcomings. The aim of this paper is to present the accuracy of Raman spectroscopy in the diagnosis and monitoring of patients with inflammatory bowel diseases. Methods: We identified the published manuscripts and abstracts up to the 31st of December 2017 by a systematic search of Medline, Embase, Cochrane and other trial registries. Results: Eight publications were found, showing sensitivities and specificities of Raman spectroscopy in diagnosing and differentiating inflammatory bowel diseases ranging from 82 to 99% and 57 to 99%, respectively, and accuracies of up to 95%. Conclusion: The technique has so far proven its potential in the positive and differential diagnosis of Crohn's disease or ulcerative colitis, allowing for very rapid results with high sensitivity and specificity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A letter to the editor is presented in response to articles on the clinical efficiency of peroral endoscopic myotomy procedure for achalasia in the previous issues .

The article presents a case study of giant inflammatory pseudotumor of the larynx in an 81-year-old man presented with significant cardiovascular co-morbidities, hoarseness, and dysphagia. The patient was treated endoscopically through a gastroenterologist using submucosal dissection. It suggests that submucosal dissection and pedical resection can remove giant pedunculated submucosal tumor masses in the larynx endoscopically in gastrointestinal endoscopy.