[Descriptive study of digestive functional symptoms in the French general population]

To study the prevalence of "reported" functional digestive symptoms (FDS) in terms easily understood by the general population without resorting to predefined concepts of functional syndromes, and to assess FDS impact on public health, a sample survey has been carried out between September and December 1995.

Four thousand eight hundred and seventeen subjects representative of the French general population aged 15 years or more filled in a questionnaire describing their digestive disorders.

Seventy percent of the subjects had digestive complaints, 9% being related to a presumably organic disease, and 61% attributed to FDS. Twenty-seven % of the subjects claimed to be inconvenienced by their FDS, whereas 34% seemed not to feel any inconvenience. Among FDS, gas emission was the most frequent symptom (59%), followed by stomach ache and/or digestive pain (48%), flatulence (47%), bad digestion sensations (40%), constipation (35%), aerophagia (29%), bad breath (22%), incomplete evacuation of stools (19%). FDS had lasted from 6 months to 5 years in 38%, and over 5 years in 52%. In the subgroup of subjects inconvenienced by FDS (27%), 9% consulted and 18% did not, whereas in the subgroup not inconvenienced, 3% consulted and 31% did not. Altogether, 26% of the subjects followed a prescription or self medication treatment; 35% were not treated. Some explanatory variables appeared to be associated with the onset of inconvenience: the associations pain and bad digestion, flatulence and aerophagia, incomplete evacuation and nervous or presumably organic origin of FDS, age, stress, FDS frequency. Duration of symptoms, age above 65 years, digestive pain, presumably organic origin, and FDS frequency were associated with the need to consult. This descriptive, pragmatic survey shows the widespread prevalence of FDS, affecting 28 million French people. Functional digestive disorders in the "academic" meaning constitute only a limited subset. FDS lead to major health care consumption. Their impact on public health is undoubtedly greater than the estimates derived from studies designed in accordance with conventional nosological categories.