Original ArticleInfant Behaviors Are Predictive of Functional Somatic Symptoms at Ages 5-7 Years: Results from the Copenhagen Child Cohort CCC2000
Section snippets
Methods
This study was part of the Copenhagen Child Cohort CCC2000,17 counting all 6090 children born in a well-defined geographical area around Copenhagen, Denmark, in 2000. The cohort has been followed prospectively since birth.
At the 5-7 years follow-up, a random sample of 3000 members of the cohort was assessed, of whom 2912 were eligible for inclusion in the present study. Nine had died and 79 were not contactable. Complete data on FSS were available for a total of 1327 children from the random
Results
The overall prevalence of any FSS was 23.2% (n = 308) with a higher prevalence among girls than boys (27.6 vs 18.8%, X2 = 14.41, P < .0001). Impairing FSS were found in 4.4% (n = 58), and in this subgroup, there was no statistically significant sex difference. Pain complaints (ie, limb pain, headache, and/or stomach ache) were the most frequent types of FSS. Further details on the epidemiology of FSS in this sample have been described elsewhere.3
Data from infancy (at least 1 routine health
Discussion
Children experiencing combined problems in the regulation of feeding, sleep, and/or tactile reactivity during infancy have a nearly 3-fold increased risk of impairing FSS at ages 5-7 years, whereas no significant associations were found regarding FSS without impairment. Thus, the differentiation between clinically-significant symptoms and the very common, nonimpairing symptoms that affect every child at one time or another seem to be important and suggest the relevance of including impairment
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2017, PsychoneuroendocrinologyCitation Excerpt :Adverse events may then act as non-specific triggers. Other factors reflecting very early autonomic hyper-reactivity, such as altered feeding, sleeping or tactile reactivity in infants, have been shown to predict the subsequent development of functional symptoms (Rask et al., 2013). In line with this concept, triggers of a physical nature (Stone et al., 2009; Parees et al., 2014) and not only psychological stressors like adverse life events have been linked to FND onset.
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Funded by TrygFonden, the Pharmaceutical Fund, the Beatrice Surovel Haskell Fund for Child Mental Health Research of Copenhagen, Mrs C. Hermansen's Memorial Fund, Lily Bethine Lund's Fund, the Research Initiative of Aarhus University Hospital Clinical Institute (Aarhus University), the Research Fund of 2004, the Medical Association in Aarhus, the Pool for Psychiatric Research (Aarhus County), Dagmar Marshall's Fund, King Christian X Fund, the Fund of Research in Mental Disorders, Rosalie Petersen's Fund, the Research Fund of the Danish Medical Association, the Fund of Research in Public Health (Aarhus County) and the Augustinus Fund. The authors declare no conflicts of interest.