Relationship between schizophrenia and psychosomatic illness: a review

For centuries, a relationship between physical illness and mental illness has been assumed. Following this lead, many reports of an inverse relationship between a number of physical disorders and schizophrenia have appeared. Particularly, the low rates of occurrence of certain psychosomatic illnesses in schizophrenic patients seem to indicate a certain biological and psychodynamic basis. These associations are important in that they may unravel important etiological relationships. Furthermore, they are amenable to testing by epidemiological investigations. Hence there is a need to pursue these studies. The current data no doubt provide impetus for further work and directions for future studies. Well controlled and methodologically sound studies in this area may be of immense value in our understanding of the pathophysiology of schizophrenia.