Edited by: Dr Mutsuhiro Nakao
Somatic complaints are often related to chronic stress-related illnesses, but the diagnoses are not obvious in all cases. In some cases, patients could be classified with functional somatic syndromes. The syndromes are defined as several related disease-conditions that are characterized more by symptoms, suffering, and disability than by structural or functional abnormality. Typically, the functional somatic syndromes include irritable bowel syndrome, tension type headache, chronic fatigue syndrome, and fibromyalgia, all of which are frequently observed in psychosomatic medicine clinics. Also, the somatic complaints which are not fully explained by a medical condition could be diagnosed as somatic symptom disorders from a view of psychiatry. According to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (DSM-5), the symptoms must cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other area of functioning. In this series in BioPsychoSocial Medicine, we present the latest findings on somatic manifestation of distress, represented by functional somatic syndromes (internal medicine), somatic symptom disorders (psychiatry), and other stress-related phenomenon.
The Editor of the series declares no competing interests.