EoE symptoms, such as dysphagia and food impaction, may produce a certain amount of fear.13 Because some patients unknowingly develop adaptive behaviors to cope with EoE, they may be unaware of their symptoms.1,3,12,33,35,36 Diagnostic delays may increase the risk of fibrostenotic complications, and the mean diagnostic delay is up to 3.5 years in children and 8 years in adults based on a systematic review.14,16,30
Use these questions to help uncover key symptoms in adults and pediatric patients.
Does your adult patient:
Does your pediatric patient*:
Does your pediatric patient*:
*For pediatric patients, the questions that uncover adaptive behaviors should change to reflect the patient's eating behaviors as those also change over time.35
Please note this is not a diagnostic tool. Symptoms vary by patient and not all patients with these symptoms have EoE.
If so, your patient may be suffering from symptoms of EoE. Consider
an endoscopy with biopsies to help assess esophageal inflammation
and confirm suspicions of EoE.1,3
*GRADE=Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development, and Evaluation.