Total gastrointestinal transit time of children with functional constipation

AIM: In order to determine the standard of total gastrointestinal transit time (TGITT), mouth intestine transit time (M ITT) and total or segmental colonic transit time (CTT) in children with functional constipation (FC) and healthy children with radiopaque markers (ROM). METHODS: 28 FC children aged 3～14 (mean 6.5±3.8) years and 68 healthy children aged 3～13 (mean 6.3±4.3) years were studied. Radiopaque markers were taken at 08:00 on day 1, and plain abdominal films were taken at 12, 24 and 48 h later. RESULTS: The TGITT, M ITT and CTT of the healthy children and FC children were (23.6±1.6) h, (9.9± 1.4) h, (14.8±1.8) and (80.4±2.1) h,(20.7± 0.6) h, (59.9±2.3) h respectively. The segmental colonic transit time includes: the right colonic transit time (RCTT), the left colonic transit time (LCTT) and the rectosigmoid colonic transit time (RSTT).The RCTT, LCTT and RSTT were (7.3±1.1) h, (3.4±0.8) h, (4.1±1.2) and (20.3± 1.2) h, (12.8±1.7) h, (26.8±1.4) h respectively. CONCLUSION: The TGITT of healthy children is significantly faster than that of adults and FC children ( P 0.01). This method is well tolerated and useful in establishing the diagnosis of functional constipation in children and in the assessment of its severity.