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Children with encopresis: a study of treatment outcome
Insights
A pediatric encopresis treatment program combining counseling, education, and bowel retraining showed significant success. Over half of children achieved sustained improvement, with many others experiencing marked or some reduction in incontinence episodes.
Area of Science:
- Pediatric Gastroenterology
- Child Psychology
Background:
- Encopresis, or fecal incontinence, affects a significant number of children.
- Effective treatment programs are crucial for improving quality of life and reducing psychosocial distress.
Purpose of the Study:
- To evaluate the outcomes of a comprehensive pediatric encopresis treatment program.
- To identify factors associated with treatment success or failure.
Main Methods:
- Establishment of a multidisciplinary pediatric treatment program.
- Inclusion of counseling, education, bowel catharsis, maintenance, retraining, and follow-up.
- Data collection on demographic, developmental, psychosocial, and clinical variables for outcome analysis.
Main Results:
- 51% of patients achieved sustained remission (no accidents for >6 months).
- 27% showed marked improvement with rare incontinence episodes.
- 14% had some improvement, and 8% showed no improvement.
Conclusions:
- The established pediatric encopresis program demonstrates considerable efficacy.
- Further analysis of patient variables is needed to optimize treatment strategies and predict outcomes.
Abstract:
A pediatric treatment program for encopresis was established in a large medical center. This consisted of counseling and education, initial bowel catharsis, a supportive maintenance program to potentiate optimum evacuation, retraining, and careful monitoring and follow-up. A group of 127 children received care for this problem. At the end of one year, outcome data were obtained on 110 patients. Of these, 51% had not had "accidents" for more than six months. Another 27% showed marked improvement and were having only rare episodes of incontinence. 14% of these children showed some improvement, but continued to have incontinence, while 8% showed no improvement whatsoever during the treatment year. These four outcome groups were compared with respect to a large number of demographic, developmental, psychosocial, and clinical variables.
