What do patients with irritable bowel syndrome dream about? A comparison with inflammatory bowel disease

Background. It is a common experience for people to dream of events about which they are either anxious or concerned. We therefore hypothesised that the dreams of patients with irritable bowel syndrome may reflect their worries about their problem especially as hospital outpatients with this disorder tend to exhibit some anxiety. In addition, dreaming about, for instance bowels, in patients with irritable bowel syndrome in excess of that observed in other gastrointestinal disorders may be of importance. Aim. To establish whether patients with irritable bowel syndrome dream about bowel-related issues more than controls or patients with inflammatory bowel disease. Patients and Methods. A total of 57 patients with irritable bowel syndrome and 57 patients with inflammatory bowel disease were compared with 60 healthy controls. All subjects completed a structured questionnaire concerning sleeping habits and dream characteristics as well as an assessment of anxiety and depression. Results. There were no differences in the sleeping habits between any of the groups. However, significantly more patients with irritable bowel syndrome and inflammatory bowel disease dreamt about their bowels (22% inflammatory bowel disease patients, 18% irritable bowel syndrome patients vs 3% of controls, p