Aim: To investigate the self-evaluation of upper gastrointestinal symptoms in Chinese patients. To observe the role of patients' characters, such as sex, age, education background, and clinic visits, which might affect the self-understanding of patients.
Methods: The nationwide cross-sectional questionnaire was administered to 3000 patients with upper gastrointestinal symptoms at 50 hospitals across 9 provinces in China. Questionnaire items covered four basic patients' characters and five major upper gastrointestinal symptoms.
Results: A total of 2799 questionnaires (response rate: 93.3%) were analyzed. Only 35.29% patients could precisely understand the definition of dyspepsia. The misunderstanding of lower-gastroenterology discomforts is the major reason leading to low accuracy rate of dyspepsia. The accuracy rate of early satiety and postprandial fullness is 37.7% and 52.27% separately; they are most interrelated and easily confused concepts to each other. The accuracy rate of heartburn is 30.02%, while the location of burning sensation is the key aspect for misunderstanding of heartburn. The self-understanding of symptoms in patients was decreased with increasing age, and enhanced with higher education background and time of clinic visits. Gender is not the independent factor.
Conclusion: Based on the low accuracy rate of self-understanding of patients, this survey suggests that the gastroenterologists should re-evaluate the symptoms of patients during the clinical inquiry.
Keywords: cross-sectional questionnaire; gastrointestinal diseases; gastrointestinal symptoms; self-evaluation.
© 2015 Journal of Gastroenterology and Hepatology Foundation and Wiley Publishing Asia Pty Ltd.