Role of psychological factors in the irritable bowel syndrome

Abstract

Our study was designed to test the hypothesis that psychoneurosis in irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) may be the secondary effects of the unsatisfactory nature of the medical transactions (diagnosis, explanation, prognosis, and therapy) in IBS rather than a primary cause of the syndrome. We carried out psychometric assessments on three groups of subjects: 10 healthy volunteers, 12 patients diagnosed as suffering from benign gastrointestinal disease, and 18 patients with IBS. We found a significantly raised incidence of psychoneurosis in IBS, but the components of this were predominantly anxiety and obsession; the incidence of depression in all 3 groups was similar. We argue that the data support our hypothesis that the psychoneurotic manifestations are secondary components of IBS; the data do not support the hypothesis that IBS is a manifestation of depression.