UTILIDAD DE LA BIOPSIA RECTAL EN EL DIAGNóSTICO DEL PACIENTE PEDIáTRICO CON ESTRE？IMIENTO. EXPERIENCIA DE CINCO A？OS EN UN CENTRO COLOMBIANO DE REFERENCIA

background. straining occurs in around 8% of paediatric aged children. most patients do not have base structural pathology and an organic cause, such as enteric neuropathy (also called hirschsprung's disease or intestinal aganglionosis), is only found in a small percentage of them; rectal biopsy plays a vital role in diagnosis in such cases. objectives. determining enteric neuropathy prevalence and the characteristics of colorectal biopsies made by the fundación hospital de la misericordia's pathology laboratory for studying patients suffering from straining over a five-year period (2005-2009). materials and methods. rectal biopsies sent for study regarding straining were reviewed and classified. results. 854 biopsies from 272 cases were evaluated, giving an average of 3.13 samples per patient. normal histology was found in 183 cases (67.29%), a diagnosis of hirschsprung's disease or aganglionosis was established in 56 patients (20.59%), intestinal neuronal dysplasia (ind) in 2 of them (0.74%), clinical symptoms were considered suspicious for ind in 8 patients (2.94%) and the remaining 22 (8.1%) were reported as having unsuitable material for studying enteric neuropathy. conclusions. rectal biopsies are a useful method for diagnosing enteric neuropathy; however, some of them cannot be suitably interpreted. the most frequently occurring aganglionosis in this series of cases was hirschsprung's disease (56 cases), followed by intestinal neuronal dysplasia with just two patients.