The Rome III criteria of functional gastrointestinal disorders of neonates and toddlers

Functional disorders in children appeared as a selected group of diseases in the Rome II Criteria for the first time. In the current classification functional disorders in children were elaborated by two scientific teams, one for children aged below 4 years of age and the second one for children aged 4-18 years. The current paper describes the diagnostic criteria and therapeutic approach in functional disorders in infants and small children. The group of disorders consists of 7 diseases. The criteria for diagnosis of regurgitation in infancy, infant dyschesia and functional diarrhoea were not changed. The new concept is to include infantile colic in functional disorders, as parents of the children affected usually seek gastroenterological consultation. Another difference is putting stool retention and constipation together as one entity and shortening of the minimal duration of constipation to 1 month. Also, for the diagnosis of cyclic vomiting, repeating of vomiting is required instead of 3 vomiting episodes within a year. The changes were made to consider earlier therapy of those patients. The coming years will provide the possibility to make further modifications based on clinical practice which will appear in future in publications.