Abstract
An 8-year-old child with cognitive, behavioral, and speech and language impairments presented to a multidisciplinary diagnostic and treatment center with long-standing secondary encopresis. The medical and behavioral literature is reviewed. The case is used to illustrate how: (1) secondary encopresis is often unreported because parents and some health professionals assume it is a natural part of the syndrome of disabilities of a multiply handicapped child; (2) it can present as a social emergency when community agencies are inconvenienced by this symptom; (3) a multidisciplinary team, using community resources, can successfully treat this symptom in the face of a number of factors which generally point toward a poor prognosis for rapid elimination of this symptom. Health professionals are urged to routinely inquire about secondary encopresis to insure that this symptom is not ignored.
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Jansson, L.M., Diamond, O. & Demb, H.B. Encopresis in a multihandicapped child: Rapid multidisciplinary treatment. J Dev Phys Disabil 4, 83–90 (1992). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01046343
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01046343