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Query: UMLS:C0028754 (obesity)
 124,988 document(s) hit in 31,850,051 MEDLINE articles (0.00 seconds)

We aimed to evaluate general features of children with chronic constipation and classified them according to the Iowa criteria and Rome II criteria in order to analyze applicability of these criteria in our population. The medical records of 485 children who were referred for chronic constipation over a six-year period were evaluated retrospectively. We found that 7.7% of the cases had an organic pathology, and short segment Hirschsprung disease was the leading cause. Other children (92.3%) were classified as functional constipation, with a mean age of 6.4 +/- 4 years and with slight male dominance. Encopresis was found in 117 children (51.7%) aged over four years, and was associated with older age, male predominance and long duration of symptoms. Both of the classification systems showed a similar prevalence of constipation, but 9.9% of the children with pediatric constipation were not recognized by Rome II criteria. Additionally, 1.8% of the children were not recognized by either Iowa or Rome criteria. Functional constipation is common in primary care, and most of the children were school-aged. Constipation associated with encopresis and nutritional problems such as obesity is less common in developing countries. Rome II criteria are too restrictive and do not recognize approximately 12% of the children. A new classification system must be simple, easy to understand especially by the primary care physician, and must include the common features of constipation recognized by the parents.
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PMID:Chronic constipation in Turkish children: clinical findings and applicability of classification criteria. 1948 Mar 26

Functional constipation (FC) is a significant health problem in children and contrary to common belief, has serious ramifications on the lives of children and their families. It is defined by the Rome criteria which encourage the use of multiple clinical features for diagnosis. FC in children has a high prevalence (0.7%-29%) worldwide, both in developed and developing countries. Biopsychosocial risk factors such as psychological stress, poor dietary habits, obesity and child maltreatment are commonly identified predisposing factors for FC. FC poses a significant healthcare burden on the already overstretched health budgets of many countries in terms of out-patient care, in-patient care, expenditure for investigations and prescriptions. Complications are common and range from minor psychological disturbances, to lower health-related quality of life. FC in children also has a significant impact on families. Many paediatric clinical trials have poor methodological quality, and drugs proved to be useful in adults, are not effective in relieving symptoms in children. A significant proportion of inadequately treated children have similar symptoms as adults. These factors show that constipation is an increasing public health problem across the world with a significant medical, social and economic impact. This article highlights the potential public health impact of FC and the possibility of overcoming this problem by concentrating on modifiable risk factors rather than expending resources on high cost investigations and therapeutic modalities.
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PMID:Childhood constipation as an emerging public health problem. 2757 Apr 23