A long-term clinical review of patients with oesophageal pain

Oesophageal and cardiac chest pain are often difficult to distinguish on clinical grounds. The clinical course of 32 patients with recurrent chest pain due to oesophageal dysmotility has recently been assessed by questionnaire 9 years after diagnosis. Twenty-six of the 27 who replied continued to have pain, but despite this there was a significant reduction in the number of hospital admissions associated with chest pain. Repeat oesophageal manometry in nine showed that the disturbance in motility persisted. Three had died, one of them from a myocardial infarction; two patients could not be traced.