title: The value of the abdominal radiograph in children with functional gastrointestinal disorders.
abstract: Functional gastrointestinal disorder is a common problem in childhood. The symptoms vary from a relative mild gastrointestinal problem such as abdominal pain or infrequent defecation to severe problems with fecal impaction and fecal incontinence. The aim of this review is to describe and evaluate the value of the different existing methods to assess fecal loading on an abdominal radiograph with or without the use of radio-opaque markers in the diagnosis of functional abdominal pain, functional constipation and functional non-retentive fecal incontinence. In our opinion, the abdominal radiograph has limited value in the diagnostic work-up of children with functional gastrointestinal disorders.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition, Academic Medical Centre, Meibergdreef 9, 1105 AZ Amsterdam, The Netherlands. mbongers@uva.amc.nl
authors.forename: Marloes E J
authors.initials: ME
authors.lastname: Bongers
authors.forename: Wieger P
authors.initials: WP
authors.lastname: Voskuijl
authors.forename: Rick R
authors.initials: RR
authors.lastname: van Rijn
authors.forename: Marc A
authors.initials: MA
authors.lastname: Benninga
mesh_terms: D015746:Abdominal Pain / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000503:physiopathology; D002648:Child; D003287:Contrast Media; D005767:Gastrointestinal Diseases / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000503:physiopathology; D005772:Gastrointestinal Transit / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D011860:Radiography, Abdominal / Q000379:methods*
chemical_list: D003287:Contrast Media