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Most patients with irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) complain of bloating, but whether these patients actually are distended, as represented by increases in abdominal girth, is unclear. In this study, investigators (who had validated a method of measuring abdominal girth called abdominal inductance plethysmography) enrolled 20 women with IBS-constipation, 20 with IBS-diarrhea, 10 with IBS-alternating, and 20 healthy controls. Abdominal girth was measured for 24 hours. All IBS patients reported bloating; bloating was worse in the evening than in the morning in all three groups of IBS patients.
IBS patients, but not controls, had increases in girth from the beginning of the day to the end of the day: 46% of IBS patients attained maximal girth at …