title: Subjective health complaints.
abstract: A variety of subjective illnesses with few or no objective findings have appeared at regular intervals as epidemics in our society under different labels. There are few or no objective findings that might explain the "disease" or the complaints go beyond what is regarded as "reasonable" by the physician. Muscle pain and other types of subjective health complaints are among the most frequent reason for encounters with general practitioners, and one of the major causes for sickness absence. The prevalence of subjective health complaints is very high, with at least 75% of the population reporting one or more subjective health complaints the past 30 days. From a statistical point of view, it is "normal" to have complaints. It is when they become intolerable that assistance is required. The difficult thing is that this threshold is individual and subjective. The psychiatric definitions of these complaints, therefore, refer only to the tip of an iceberg.
authors: Department of Biological and Medical Psychology, University of Bergen, Norway. hege.eriksen@psych.uib.no
authors: Hege R
authors: HR
authors: Eriksen
authors: Camilla
authors: C
authors: Ihlebaek
mesh_terms: D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D013001:Somatoform Disorders / Q000523:psychology*