Irritable Bowel Syndrome Message Boards | 11 year old daughter been in pain every night for a year!

I had severe IBS when I was ten and it was pain predominate and effected me all the time.

Here is some info for you.

However, there are things you can do.

I am posting some really good resources and information here for you.

This is information from the International Foundation for Functional Gastrointestinal Disorders. On there website kidsgihealth.

This here is really good information.

Questions and Answers

http://www.aboutkidsgi.org/questionsandanswers.html

and

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Childhood abdominal pain is a common complaint, and it may progress to adult irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) in some cases, according to a study in the American Journal of Gastroenterology.

IBS is marked by bloating, pain, constipation and diarrhea, and often doesn't seem to have a direct physical cause -- although the symptoms are certainly real.

"The natural history of childhood abdominal pain and its association with adult IBS remain poorly described," Dr. Nicholas J. Talley, of the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine, Rochester, Minnesota, and colleagues note in their report.

To investigate, they assessed the characteristics of childhood abdominal pain over the first 11 years of life in some 1,000 children born in Dunedin, New Zealand in 1972, and examined the association of childhood abdominal pain with IBS at when the participants reached 26 years of age.

A history of abdominal pain was documented in 18 percent of the children.

Childhood abdominal pain was more common in females than in males. The prevalence of abdominal pain peaked at age 7 to 9 years among boys, but it remained stable across assessments for females.

IBS at age 26 years was about 2 or 3 times more common among subjects with a history of childhood abdominal pain between the ages of 7 and 9 years compared to those with no history.

Factoring in gender, socioeconomic status, psychiatric disorder at age 26, childhood emotional distress, or maternal malaise did not alter this association.

"The emergence of multiple stressors in the home and school environment may present a plausible mechanism to account for these findings," Talley's team suggests.

As they point out, "The 7 to 9 year age-period follows closely from the school starting age in many cultures, and children who are predisposed to stress-related disorders may be at particular risk of developing symptomatic complaints at this point."

SOURCE: American Journal of Gastroenterology, September 2005.

and
webmd
Mind-Body Technique Eases Kids' Gut Pain

Kids Have Fewer Days of Abdominal Pain When Using Relaxation Technique

http://www.webmd.com/content/article/72/81542.htm

FYI

Defecation Anxiety Linked to Functional Constipation in Children

Charlene Laino

Oct. 15, 2003 (Baltimore) � Children with functional constipation have significantly more anxiety related to toileting behavior than healthy children � anxiety. This anxiety makes them more likely to continue to suffer from the problem, a prospective study suggests.

Moreover, some of these children develop generalized anxiety, reported researchers from the Cleveland Clinic Foundation.

"Constipated kids were not generally anxious overall, but among those with defecation anxiety we saw an increase in general anxiety," said Gerard Banez, PhD, a child psychologist at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. "This does not prove cause-and-effect, but does suggest that those constipated children with greater defecation anxiety also exhibit increased general anxiety."

Painful bowel movements can make a child fearful of pain, Dr. Banez said. That fear can be generalized to sitting on the toilet.

The research was described here today at the American College of Gastroenterology 68th annual scientific meeting.

Up to 7.5% of children suffer from constipation, which accounts for about 3% of visits to pediatricians and up to 25% of visits to pediatric gastroenterologists, according to data cited in the study.

According to the researchers, constipation carries a host of physical and psychological consequences, and defecation anxiety is often implicated as a primary contributor to constipation.

Dr. Banez and colleagues studied 98 boys and girls aged 6 to 18 years who suffered from functional constipation. The youngsters completed the Defecation Anxiety Scale�Self-Report and Revised Children's Manifest Anxiety Scale, which measures generalized anxiety. The parents also rated their children's defecation anxiety on the Defecation Anxiety Scale�Parent Rating Scales.

By both self-report and parent report, children with functional constipation were found to have significantly more defecation anxiety than healthy children or children with asthma, the researchers said.

Overall, 70% of the children reported defecation anxiety compared with 58% of a control group of healthy children and 65% of children with asthma. The parents reported that 82% of their children suffered from defecation anxiety.

In addition, 30% of the children with constipation reported generalized anxiety. The greater the defecation anxiety, the greater the generalized anxiety, Dr. Banez said. Children with defecation anxiety have a higher chance of having generalized anxiety, although some children with no significant generalized anxiety still had defecation anxiety, he added.

Physicians who see children with constipation anxiety should rule out any medical cause, Dr. Banez said. Also, consider defecation anxiety in the differential diagnosis of any child whose parents report that their child seems to be withholding stool, is tearful at the urge to use the toilet, or shows vigorous resistance to using the toilet, he said.

Also, physicians should discuss strategies that promote relaxed toilet sitting as well as suggest dietary changes � possibly with a stool softener thrown in � to promote softer stools, Dr. Banez said.

William Whitehead, MD, professor of medicine at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill, said he has had some luck treating constipation anxiety with biofeedback, although he said that studies in Europe suggest that laxatives work just as well as the relaxation technique.

The question now, he said, is whether anxiety is the cause or the consequence of constipation. ?This study doesn?t really tell us, but it is still a major advance, the first trial I know of where they have linked defecation and anxiety directly using such a systematic approach.?

ACG 68th Annual Scientific Meeting: Abstract 723. Presented Oct. 15, 2003.

Reviewed by Gary D. Vogin, MD

Kids Take Sickness Cue From Parents
Excerpt By Nancy A. Melville, HealthScoutNews

(HealthScoutNews) -- The behavioral patterns of those with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) can color their children's experiences of their own illnesses.

http://preventdisease.com/news/articles/kids_sickness_parents.shtml

Childhood bellyaches can be gut-wrenching
Agony but no answers: Youngsters sometimes endure months of unsuccessful tests, bouncing from doctor to doctor
See BELLYACHES, D2

Bellyaches often defy easy cures
By Laurie Tarkan
The New York Times

Color illustration by Earl F. Lam III

When 12-year-old Hannah Scott began middle school last year, she was so nervous that her stomach was not just in knots, it was in serious pain.
''It would start in the morning when I'd leave the house,'' said Hannah, a wisp of a girl with light brown freckles and long sandy hair. ''And when I got to school, it was really, really bad. I'd go to the nurse every other day, and be sent home.''
When the bellyaches persisted for months, Hannah's parents took her to a pediatric gastroenterologist, who ordered tests, including X-rays, a colonoscopy and an endoscopy, to rule out serious problems.
After nothing showed up, the ailment was diagnosed as irritable bowel syndrome, a gastrointestinal disorder with no organic cause and no proven treatment in children. But the doctor said there was nothing to do about it; eventually, it got so bad that her parents pulled her out of school.
An estimated 10 percent to 20 percent of all school-age children suffer severe recurrent abdominal pain. But many children and adolescents go for 13 to 18 months before being treated, and some are never treated at all.
In some cases, untreated pain is so debilitating that they miss school, dance classes, sports activities and social events. They are at risk of falling behind academically, physically, socially and developmentally.
Experts say that organic causes like ulcers, inflammation or intestinal blockages are to blame in only a small minority of children, 5 percent to 10 percent.
A majority suffer instead from what are called functional gastrointestinal disorders. The most common are functional abdominal pain, in which pain is the only symptom; irritable bowel syndrome, which brings on pain along with diarrhea or constipation; and functional dyspepsia, which typically shows up as pain with nausea or a feeling of fullness.
Often, children who have recurrent abdominal pain are put through a battery of invasive tests. They are placed on restrictive diets and given large doses of acid-suppressing medications or anti-diarrhea drugs, which may offer some relief for the symptoms, but often do nothing for pain.
Some children are told that their illness is ''all in their head,'' or that they are faking it.
''There are a lot of misconceptions that make the life of these children more difficult,'' said Carlo Di Lorenzo, chief of pediatric gastroenterology at Children's Hospital of Columbus, Ohio.
''They bounce from doctor to doctor, get more and more tests, until things get better or they find a specialist who knows how to treat them,'' Di Lorenzo said. In fact, there are clear criteria for diagnosing disorders that cause recurrent abdominal pain, and for most children, the diagnosis can be made without invasive tests.

Brain and gut: New approaches to treating pain are already being used in adults, including cognitive behavioral therapy; alternative treatments like relaxation techniques and massage therapy; and antidepressants. But they have not been widely adopted for children, in part because only a handful of small studies support such use.
In recent years, however, experts have begun to understand more about the connections between the brain and the gut, a relationship that is reflected in popular expressions like ''a gut-wrenching experience'' or ''having butterflies in your stomach.''
The gastrointestinal tract is awash in nerve cells and neurotransmitters. About 95 percent of the body's neurotransmitter serotonin is in the intestinal tract. Stress, nervousness, fear and other emotions often play out their own drama in the gut. In children with abdominal pain, the intestinal tract becomes hypersensitive to stimuli, with the slightest bit of gas, for instance, sending a flood of pain signals to the brain.
The problem appears to be a mismatch in signaling between the brain and the gut, said Lonnie Zeltzer, director of the Pediatric Pain Program at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles. ''If you have ongoing pain, you can develop abnormal pain pathways, so that the volume of pain signaling

is being turned up and up,'' Zeltzer said.
What causes the hypersensitivity is not completely understood, but experts believe that it is often set off by a stomach virus or an infection.
''It's not uncommon that a family will get viral gastroenteritis, the whole family gets better except the child,'' said Zeltzer, author of Conquering Your Child's Chronic Pain: A Pediatrician's Guide for Reclaiming a Normal Childhood. ''The pain system is turned on and stays on.''
Experts do not know why some children and adolescents develop this problem and others do not. One clue may be that children with abdominal pain tend to be unusually worried and anxious.
As an understanding of the brain-gut connection grows, however, some centers have begun to use techniques like cognitive behavioral therapy, relaxation training, massage therapy and other alternative approaches as a first line of treatment.
The effectiveness of these therapies is still debated, and the number of studies examining their effectiveness in children is very small, experts say. In one study published in the August issue of The Journal of Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition, 18 children ages 8 through 17 who had pain for about a year were taught guided imagery and progressive relaxation.
In four to seven sessions, 89 percent of the children reported a reduction in pain, to an average of two episodes a week, from six, said Nader N. Youssef, a pediatric gastroenterologist at the Goryeb Children's Hospital in Morristown, N.J. and the lead author of the study. The children had fewer missed school days, and their quality-of-life scores rose significantly.

Tests can be stressful: Another novel approach is the use of antidepressants for the pain. An analysis of large studies of adults with functional abdominal pain found evidence for the effectiveness of low doses of tricyclic antidepressants, though the drugs have not been studied in children for such complaints.
Tricyclics, an older class of antidepressants, have also been associated with rare cases of unexplained sudden death, and some doctors require an electrocardiogram before prescribing them to children.
For those parents trying to help children cope with recurrent bellyaches, experts say it is important to understand that there does not have to be an organic reason for the pain, Zeltzer said. She advised parents to avoid unnecessary tests, because the tests themselves are stressful.
She and other experts recommend that parents help children learn relaxation techniques like breathing methods, progressive muscle relaxation or visualization to use when they are feeling stressed. The techniques are explained on many Web sites.
Children with recurrent stomach pain, experts say, should be kept in school and should stay involved in activities, if possible. These distractions help take the focus off the pain. Good sleep habits and exercise also help reduce pain.
In Hannah's case, her mother took her to a pain management center in Kansas City, Mo., where she learned cognitive behavioral strategies to help change her reactions to stress and relaxation exercises to reduce the stress and pain.
By late March, Hannah was back in school. ''I think I stopped thinking about it and worrying about it,'' she said.

http://www.sltrib.com/healthscience/ci_2546772;jsessionid=KDPSAI1MCRB1ECUUCBQSFEY

KidsHealth.org Gastrointestinal Problems

KidsHealth.org Gastrointestinal Problems
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FYI

"Gastrointestinal Problems

Sun Dec 5, 7:00 PM ET

KidsHealth.org

Yahoo! Health
Have questions about your health?
Find answers here.

"I can go by myself now." You proudly celebrated the day when your toddler began to make toilet trips alone. But now you need to guide him through a childhood that's bound to have a tummy ache or two. How do you know what's normal?

Many parents expect their child to pass one bowel movement (stool) each day, and they begin to worry if this doesn't happen. But a daily bowel movement isn't necessarily "normal" for every child, and your child may have anywhere from three bowel movements a day to three a week and still be OK. The key here is to check for signs of pain, cramps, bloating, or fullness in the abdomen. Stools should be soft and easy to pass - neither too watery nor too dry and hard. And if your child sees blood with a bowel movement, either in the toilet water or on a toilet tissue, you should always call your child's doctor.

Constipation
Common adult bowel problems can affect children, too. For example, constipation can trouble children who eat a typical fast food diet - rich in fats (burgers, fries, milkshakes) and processed sugars (candy, cookies, sugary soft drinks). These children may have bowel movements that are hard, dry, and painful. Their time between bowel movements may be 4 days or more.

If constipation is a problem for your child, you might first take a serious look at his diet - does it include enough water and enough dietary fiber? Check for good exercise habits, since physical activity nudges the bowels into action. Also, setting a regular meal schedule can help some children develop regular bowel habits, since eating is another natural stimulant for bowel activity. If necessary, schedule breakfast a little earlier to give your child a chance for a relaxed visit to the bathroom before school.

Some children become constipated because they ignore the natural urge to empty their bowels. They may not want to use a restroom away from home, or they may feel embarrassed to ask a teacher to be excused from class. When this happens, simple reassurance from you and your child's teacher may be the only treatment necessary.

Most childhood constipation problems can be helped by sensible changes in lifestyle or diet. Laxatives are not usually needed. In fact, using laxatives unnecessarily can actually cause constipation. So always ask your child's doctor before giving your child any medicine for irregularity. Rarely, constipation can be a sign of other medical illnesses, so keep your child's doctor informed if your child continues to have problems.

Irritable Bowel Syndrome
In adults, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) is responsible for almost as many work absences as the common cold. IBS can affect children, too, giving them a puzzling set of digestive complaints. Sometimes it's cramps, gas, and diarrhea; sometimes it's bloating and constipation; and sometimes it's alternating bouts of both. Children with IBS may sometimes pass mucus with their bowel movements, but they have no rectal bleeding or fever.

IBS often troubles children during times of stress - family problems, divorce, moving, taking exams, even going on vacations. But IBS is not a psychological problem; it has a physical cause. People with IBS have bowels that go into spasms more easily than those who don't, and scientists don't yet know why.

What they do know is that certain types of foods (milk, chocolate, caffeine) can trigger IBS in both children and adults. And IBS symptoms often improve when these foods are limited. Increasing fiber in the diet, and using techniques to relieve stress also seem to help. If necessary, your child's doctor may prescribe medicines to relieve symptoms.

Lactose Intolerance
For many children, an ice cream sundae or a cool glass of milk at lunch means an afternoon of cramps, gas, and diarrhea. If this happens to your child, he may be one of the more than 30 million Americans who have lactose intolerance. This condition is common in Americans with Asian, African, and Mediterranean family origins. Across the world, about 70% of all people may have some degree of lactose intolerance.

In this condition, the body manufactures too little lactase, an enzyme found in the intestines. Lactase breaks down lactose, a sugar that's found in milk and milk products. When lactose isn't broken down in the intestines, it ferments and causes gas and diarrhea.

If you notice that milk products seem to affect your child's digestive system, talk to your child's doctor. Growing children still need the calcium and vitamins found in dairy products. So if milk is a problem for your child, your child's doctor can suggest other types of foods that will supply these nutrients. Dairy products made especially for persons with lactose intolerance are sold in many supermarkets. Lactase enzyme supplements are also sold as drops and tablets. These are safe for children and may be used as your child's doctor recommends."

www.kidshealth.org/

This is also something very much worth reading

Mind-Body-Pain Connection: How Does It Work?

By Michael Henry Joseph
WebMD Live Events Transcript

Event Date: 05/11/2000.

Moderator: Welcome to WebMD Live's World Watch and Health News Auditorium. Today we are discussing "The Mind-Body-Pain Connection: How Does It Work?" with Brenda Bursch, Ph.D., Michael Joseph, M.D., and Lonnie Zeltzer, M.D.

Brenda Bursch, Ph.D., is the Associate Director of the Pediatric Pain Program, Co-Director of Pediatric Chronic Pain Clinical Service and Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry & Biobehavioral Sciences at UCLA Department of Pediatrics in the School of Medicine. She has written about asthma, developmental & behavioral pediatrics, emergency medicine, AIDS education and prevention, chronic digestive diseases and pediatric bowel disorders. She has membership in the American Pain Society, American Psychological Association, Munchausen Syndrome by Proxy Network, and the UCLA Center for the Study of Organizational and Group Dynamics.

Michael Henry Joseph, MD, is an assistant professor of pediatrics and co-director of Chronic Pain Services at the University of California at Los Angeles Children's Hospital. He is a recipient of the Golden Apple Award for Excellence in Teaching.

Lonnie Zeltzer, M.D., is an expert in the field of pediatric pain. She is a former president of the Society for Adolescent Medicine and member of the National Institute of Health?s Human Development Study Section. She is currently a Professor of Pediatrics and Anesthesiology at the UCLA School of Medicine. She is Director of the UCLA Pediatric Pain Program and Associate Director of the Patients & Survivors Section, Cancer Prevention and Control Research Branch of the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center. She has well over one hundred scientific publications, reviews and chapters in medical journals, and has lectured internationally.

http://www.webmd.com/content/article/1/1700_50465

this is another important one

The Other Brain Also Deals With Many Woes

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/23/health/23gut.html?ex=1282449600&en=1e310e52565798bf&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

Hypnotherapy can be used with a 11 year old. Not a problem and kids usally respond very well to it.

This is important, the hypno does not have to be used just for stress and anxiety IBS but on IBS in general, stress and anxiety reduction are side effects and part of the process, but HT has shown to change physical issues in regards to IBS.

Reading the "first year IBS" can help for the information and eating for IBS.

Its important to treat young people early on for the best results later on in there life.

This is important for parents to know also.

http://www.kiwiterapi.dk/whiplash/frames/gutthoughts.htm

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My website on IBS is www.ibshealth.com

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