[The next consensus for the irritable bowel syndrome has to be interdisciplinary]

The publication of the Rome III consensus on functional bowel disorders one year ago has raised the question of whether a revision of the 1999 Celle consensus on the irritable bowel syndrome is necessary and who should be involved in this consensus. Therefore, the this review article attempts to reconstruct the history of the Rome criteria (and its predecessor, the Manning criteria) and contrasts this with the parallel history of the DSM/ICD classification in primary care and psychiatry/psychosomatics. The formulation of a common consensus between all medical societies (primary care, gastroenterology/neurogastroenterology, psychiatry/psychosomatics) is proposed instead of another consensus of gastroenterologists alone, in order to avoid the tendency--at both national and international levels--towards isolation between the medical subspecialties.