Original article—alimentary tractPrevalence of Functional Gastrointestinal Disorders in Patients With Fibromyalgia and the Role of Psychologic Distress
Section snippets
Population
Patients were selected randomly from the Madrilian Association of Patients with Fibromyalgia, which requires a medical diagnosis of FM performed by a rheumatologist according to the American College of Rheumatology (ACR) criteria4 to be enrolled. Controls were selected randomly from a list of the Madrid electoral census and matched by age and sex with patients.
All controls selected were first contacted by telephone and those who agreed to participate completed the questionnaires over the
Results
We included 100 patients and 100 controls matched by age and sex. Controls showed a slightly higher educational level than cases, but no significant differences on other characteristics (Table 1). We identified 6 cases of widespread musculoskeletal pain among controls (6%; 95% confidence interval, 1.5–10.6). Exclusion of these subjects from the analysis did not modify results. The overall impact of FM in a patient's life as assessed by the FIQ was 67.28 ± 14.25 among patients.
Discussion
Our study was designed with the purpose of better understanding the prevalence of FGIDs in Spanish patients with FM, as well as assessing whether certain psychologic abnormalities were related to the presence of FGID in patients with FM.
In addition, we found a 6% prevalence of widespread pain among controls that reinforced the concept that this is a prevalent condition in the general population.1, 2, 3
Our case-control study confirms the high prevalence of FGID in patients with FM and shows that
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Conflicts of Interest The authors disclose no conflicts.
Funding This study was supported by an unrestricted grant from the Mutua Madrileña Foundation for Medical Research.