Cardiovascular autonomic regulation, quality of life and stress perception in IBS and healthy controls

Impaired autonomic function is believed to contribute to visceral hypersensitivity and abnormal gastrointestinal motility in IBS. There is no general agreement about the role of autonomic nervous system dysfunction in the generation or maintenance of IBS symptoms. Aim was to describe and compare cardiovascular autonomic function at baseline and after laboratory tests as well as quality of life and stress perception in IBS and healthy controls. We examined 17 IBS (10 female, age: 38.5, SD: 15.3, bmi:22.3, SD: 3.7) and 17 sex-, age- and bmi- matched healthy controls. Patients and subjects completed the SF36 and th…