Abdominal Pain in Girls at Puberty

Abstract

Morris Green's article "Diagnosis and Treatment: Psychogenic, Recurrent, Abdominal Pain" in the July 1967 issue of Pediatrics calls attention to a presenting complaint well-known to pediatric practitioners. Girls in the early months of puberty often come to their physicians with a complaint of recurrent abdominal pain of a somewhat cyclical nature. Physical findings are variable, although there is often some tenderness in one of the lower abdominal quadrants. The general heightened sensitivity to any bodily discomfort which accompanies the pubertal increase in hormone level causes pubescent girls to be quite aware of and frightned by this pain.