Multidisciplinary Care for Refractory Pediatric Functional Abdominal Pain Decreases Emergency and Inpatient Utilization

Authors

Andrew S Chu
Laura Torres
Grace Kao
Caroyl Gilbert
Evelyn Caro Monico
Bruno P Chumpitazi

Publication Date

2-1-2022

Journal

Journal of Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition

DOI

10.1097/MPG.0000000000003305

PMID

34560729

PMCID

PMC8799479

PubMedCentral® Posted Date

2-1-2023

PubMedCentral® Full Text Version

Author MSS

Published Open-Access

yes

Keywords

Abdominal Pain, Adolescent, Child, Emergency Service, Hospital, Hospitalization, Humans, Inpatients, Patient Acceptance of Health Care, Retrospective Studies, Chronic pain, multimodal therapy, pain management, disorders of gut-brain interaction, irritable bowel syndrome

Abstract

Children with refractory functional abdominal pain (FAP) experience functional disability and may utilize emergency department (ED) and/or inpatient services. Whether multidisciplinary programs which help care for children with refractory FAP affect acute healthcare utilization is unknown. A retrospective chart review of children initially evaluated by the outpatient Multidisciplinary Abdominal Pain Program (MAPP) from October 2016 to May 2019 was completed. Patient characteristics and number of ED visits and hospitalizations for abdominal pain in the year prior to versus year after MAPP evaluation were captured. Thirty-eight children (ages 9-17 years [median 13 years]) were included. The median number of ED visits/patient/year decreased from 1 (range: 0-7) to 0 (range: 0-3) (P < 0.0001). Seven (18%) children had been hospitalized and, in these children, the median number of hospitalizations/patient/year decreased from 1 (range: 1-5) to 0 (range: 0-1) (P < 0.05). These data suggest multidisciplinary outpatient intervention for refractory FAP is associated with significant decreases in acute healthcare utilization.