Pouchology.org
What is Pouchology?
Pouchology is an AI-curated collection and searchable knowledge base of 1,297 peer-reviewed publications on the ileal pouch-anal anastomosis (IPAA, or "J-pouch"). It covers the full scope of pouch surgery: operative technique, complications, quality of life, long-term outcomes, pouchitis, fertility, revisional surgery, and emerging topics like biologics and robotic approaches.
This collection spans 40 years (1987–2026) and includes full-text search across PDF extracts. Papers are indexed by first author, year, PMID, and searchable abstract and full text. This is a research tool — enter any clinical question above to find relevant evidence.
PouchRAG — AI-Powered Q&A
Ask clinical questions in plain language and get evidence-based answers synthesized from over 900 IPAA publications, with cited sources.
Coming SoonPouchRAG uses retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) — an AI technique that searches the literature collection first, then generates an answer grounded in the actual studies it finds, rather than relying on general knowledge alone.
In the meantime, use Search Collection to find papers by keyword.
Why Pouchology?
Ileal pouch–anal anastomosis (IPAA) is one of the most complex reconstructive procedures in gastrointestinal surgery. The published literature on pouch surgery spans nearly four decades, thousands of papers, and dozens of subspecialty topics—from pouchitis and fistula management to fertility, robotic technique, and long-term quality of life.
Yet this knowledge is scattered across journals, hard to search, and often inaccessible to the clinicians and patients who need it most.
Pouchology was created to solve this problem. It is an AI-curated collection and searchable knowledge base of over 900 peer-reviewed publications on the ileal pouch, indexed by topic, author, year, and PMID. Every paper in the collection has been extracted from PDF, classified by study type, and made searchable across abstracts and full text.
The topic summaries and evidence overviews you see on this site were generated by artificial intelligence to help users quickly orient to each area of pouch literature. They are not a substitute for reading the primary sources—they are a starting point.
Pouchology is a project of the iPouch Consortium, an international quality improvement initiative dedicated to advancing the care of pouch patients worldwide.
About the Founder
Stefan D. Holubar, MD, MS, FACS, FASCRS
Stefan Holubar brings a unique perspective to pouch surgery: he is both a fellowship-trained colorectal surgeon specializing in ileal pouch procedures and himself a pouch patient. This dual lived experience—from both sides of the operating table—drives his commitment to ensuring that every patient who needs a pouch receives the highest quality of care.
Dr. Holubar is co-PI of the Crohn's & Colitis Foundation IBD-SIRCQ, co-PI of the ACS-NSQIP IBD Collaborative (26 sites nationally), founder of the iPouch Consortium, and has authored over 300 peer-reviewed publications, the majority focused on IBD surgical outcomes. His research spans pouch volume–outcome relationships, risk prediction, benchmarking, and the application of AI to surgical quality improvement.
Pouchology represents his vision of making the full scope of pouch literature accessible, searchable, and useful—for surgeons, gastroenterologists, trainees, and patients alike.