Body drawings as an assessment tool for body-relatedness in patients with severe somatic symptom disorder

Abstract

Background: A core feature of somatic symptom disorder is the troubled relation of patients to their body. Efforts to assess body-relatedness have been focusing on self-report questionnaires, which may overlook important aspects of body-relatedness. Drawings of the felt sense of the body could have added value but its diagnostic usefulness is still unclear. The reliability, validity, and sensitivity of observer scores of characteristics of body drawings made by patients with severe somatic symptom disorder were examined.