Related Experiment Videos
Endoscopic examinations in children with recurrent abdominal pain
1Department of Child Health, Airlangga School of Medicine, Dr. Soetomo Hospital, Surabaya.
Insights
Fiber optic endoscopy aids in diagnosing recurrent abdominal pain in children when other tests fail. It identified various gastrointestinal issues and psychosomatic causes, proving a safe and reliable diagnostic tool.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Gastroenterology
- Diagnostic Endoscopy
Background:
- Recurrent abdominal pain (RAP) in children presents diagnostic challenges due to variable symptoms.
- Conventional investigations often yield inconclusive results for RAP.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the utility of fiber optic endoscopy in diagnosing the causes of recurrent abdominal pain in children.
- To assess the safety and reliability of endoscopy for identifying organic intestinal lesions.
Main Methods:
- A study involving 62 children aged 3-13 with recurrent abdominal pain.
- Fiber optic endoscopy was performed to examine the upper gastrointestinal tract.
- Findings were correlated with other investigations where applicable.
Main Results:
- Endoscopy revealed organic lesions in 16 children: erosion (7), esophagitis (4), duodenitis (3), and pyloric spasm (2).
- 30 children had "normal" endoscopic findings, with underlying causes including psychosomatic issues (7), allergies (4), UTIs (4), and giardiasis (2).
- No significant correlation was found between endoscopic and upper gastrointestinal series findings.
Conclusions:
- Fiber optic endoscopy is a safe and reliable tool for diagnosing organic gastrointestinal lesions in children with recurrent abdominal pain.
- Endoscopy provides valuable diagnostic information in cases where initial investigations are inconclusive.
- It helps differentiate organic pathology from non-organic causes like psychosomatic issues and infections.
Abstract:
Much difficulties are often encountered in finding the underlying cause of recurrent abdominal pain. Clinical features may vary from one patient to the other and occasionally from one episode to the next even in the same child. The recent development of fibre optic endoscopy may well prove to have a useful diagnostic technique, particularly in those children in whom other investigations are inconclusive. The result of endoscopic examinations in children with recurrent abdominal pain comprising of 62 children aged between 3-13 years were as follows: erosion in 7 children, oesophagitis in 4 children, duodenitis in 3 children, spasm of the pylorus in 2 children, and normal findings were found in 30 children. Of the 30 patients with "normal" endoscopic findings, 7 had psychosomatic problems, 4 had allergy, 4 had urinary tract infection, 2 showed giardiasis, one had epilepsy, 1 was treated as pulmonary tuberculosis, where as in 11 patients organic as well as nonorganic abnormalities could not be found. There seem to be of no significant correlation between the endoscopic and upper gastrointestinal series findings. Endoscopy seem to be of a safe and reliable tool in the diagnosis of a number of organic intestinal lesions otherwise not detected by ordinary investigations.