WORLD:
Hardly any other disease is currently being talked about as often as irritable bowel syndrome ...
Annette Fritscher-Ravens:
Oh, I have to correct that.
Irritable bowel syndrome is not a disorder on its own, but rather a complex of symptoms.
Hence the term “syndrome”.
Cancer or severe inflammatory bowel disease can actually be behind it.
But that rarely happens.
Rather, the problem is that conventional medicine often fails to find a demonstrable explanation for the complex of symptoms - flatulence, abdominal pain and changes in bowel habits such as constipation or diarrhea - and therefore likes to classify it as functional.
In the end, many of those affected have had a real doctor odyssey, and it is not uncommon for them to be declared a case for psychosomatics or even psychiatry.
WORLD:
But would you confirm that this syndrome occurs very often?