1982 Volume 22 Issue 4 Pages 305-313
Fifty-two patients with chronic abdominal pain were studied psychosomatically as to psychosomatic diagnosis, and the results were summarized as follws : 1. While male patients consisted predominantly of those with their ages above 40,female patients predominantly of those under 39.2. Exclusive diagnosis, positive diagnosis and therapeutic diagnosis were made to our subjects at the same time and the results revealed that the incidence of decisive factors for therapeutic diagnosis was as high as 44%.3. High incidences of the final diagnoses included chronic pancreatitis, which was 40 percent, followed by irritable bowel syndrome, which was 19 percent.4. With regard to incidences of complications, irritable bowel syndrome ranked first, followed by biliary dyskinesia, followed by depression and neurosis in that order.5. Fatal diseases, such as cancer of the pancreas and colonic tuberculosis, were erroneously diagnosed as psychogenic abdominal pains.6. Psychogenic abdominal pains were classified into five types according to their geneses, which were Psychopathic, Neurotic, Functional, Organic and Others. The frequency of these geneses was examined and the results showed that the Others, which had overlapping geneses, predominated, and as high as 78 percent of the Others were overlapped with the Organic group.7. Psychological mechanisms of pains were classified into three types and our subjects were examined accordingly. As the result, result, psychological reactions readily causing pain, such as depressive state, were seen as high at 51 percent.8. In diagnosing chronic abdominal pain, it was useful to apply both the classification of psychogenic abdominal pain and that of psychological mechanisms.
