somatization disorder

n. A family of psychological disturbances which produce bodily manifestations which cause significant distress and interfere with the daily functioning of the sufferer. This includes somatization disorder, in which the individual has a recurring pattern of multiple, clinically significant complaints for which physical causes cannot be found and which are judged by the clinician to be due to psychological factors; undifferentiated somatoform disorder, in which there are persistent complaints of chronic fatigue, loss of appetite, or gastrointestinal, genitourinary, or other symptoms without obvious physical cause and attributed by a clinician to psychological factors; conversion disorder, in which voluntary or sensory nerve functioning is impaired (such as numbness or paralysis of a body part) without apparent physical cause and attributed by a clinician to psychological factors; pain disorder, in which a specific pain interferes with daily functioning and becomes the focus of the person's life without sufficient physical cause and is attributed by a clinician to psychological factors; and hypochondriasis, in which a person is incapacitated by multiple fears of having a disease based on misinterpretation of bodily symptoms that are not allayed by medical opinions to the contrary.