Functional dyspepsia, definition and epidemiology

Functional dyspepsia has been defined as medical condition that significantly impacts on the usual activities of a patient, and is characterized by one or more of the following symptoms: postprandial fullness, early satiation, epigastric pain, and epigastric burning, without evidence of organic, systemic, or metabolic disease. It is a frequent entity with a global prevalence of 7.2%. In Latin America, prevalence is reported from 6.6% to 10.6%. There are two subgroups of functional dyspepsia: postprandial distress syndrome and epigastric pain syndrome; however, there is overlap between them even in one third of cases. These subgroups have different pathophysiology and different response to therapy. Functional dyspepsia is associated to poor quality of life and it has an impact in health costs.