Anamnestic and psychological features in diagnosis and prognosis of functional abdominal complaints: a prospective study.

Psychological and anamnestic data from 308 patients were collected to investigate whether patients with abdominal complaints from organic causes could be distinguished psychologically or by their case histories from patients with functional abdominal complaints. Two years later the same patients took part in a follow up study. Only 9% of the patients with functional abdominal complaints became symptom free. Most variables showed no significant difference between the organic and the functional group. The most important variables with predictive value were psychological factors, factors associated with the severity and factors associated with the duration of the complaints.