Influence of the requirement for abdominal pain in the diagnosis of irritable bowel syndrome with constipation (IBS-C) under the Rome IV criteria using data from a large Japanese population-based internet survey

Rome III was revised to Rome IV in May 2016. One important change in the Rome IV criteria is that abdominal pain must be present for a diagnosis of irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Under Rome III, in contrast, patients with abdominal discomfort only could be diagnosed with IBS, but these cases under Rome IV are now classified as unspecified functional bowel disorder (FBD). In a simple comparison of Rome III and Rome IV, it is unclear whether this...