What are somatoform disorders?
Definition The somatoform disorders are a group of mental disturbances placed in a common category on the basis of their external symptoms. These disorders are characterized by physical complaints that appear to be medical in origin but that cannot be explained in terms of a physical disease, the results of substance abuse, or by another mental disorder. In order to meet the criteria for a somatoform disorder, the physical symptoms must be serious enough to interfere with the patient’s employment or relationships, and must be symptoms that are not under the patient’s voluntary control. It is helpful to understand that the present classification of these disorders reflects recent historical changes in the practice of medicine and psychiatry. When psychiatry first became a separate branch of medicine at the end of the nineteenth century, the term hysteria was commonly used to describe mental disorders characterized by altered states of consciousness (for example, sleepwalking or trance s
