Outcome of Infant Regurgitation Diagnosed by Rome Ⅳ Criteria

Abstract

Background: Infant regurgitation is the most prevalent functional gastrointestinal disorder in infancy. Knowing the benign outcome of such condition helps to decrease the anxiety of parents and unnecessary prescriptions by physicians. Objectives: The aims of the current work were to detect the outcome of infant regurgitation among Egyptian infants diagnosed by Rome Ⅳ criteria and to detect its prevalence among the surveyed population. Patients and Methods: A prospective cohort study enrolling 280 healthy infants 1-4 months diagnosed as infant regurgitation according to Rome Ⅳcriteria by fulfilling a questionnaire and undergoing examination. Parents were reassured and educated then both were repeated after 3 months. According to the outcome, infants were divided into symptomatic infants, who were either partially improved or not-improved at all and asymptomatic infants who had stopped regurgitation. Results: The prevalence of regurgitation was 20.3% among the surveyed 1380 infants. On follow up 42.9% of infants became asymptomatic while 49.6% partially improved and only 7.5% didn't improve. Weight was properly gained for all patients except 3 who had failure to thrive, however that was not correlated with the outcome of regurgitation. Proton pump inhibitors were prescribed for 7.7% of cases, however, increasing age was the only predictor of total improvement after 3 months follow up with odds ratio=2.45 and confidence interval (1.57-3.84). Conclusion: Infant regurgitation diagnosed according to Rome Ⅳ criteria seems to be normal behavior in early infancy which resolves by time, just requiring parental , reassurance, and follow up, while no interventions are needed.