Mental health Learning Hub

Functional disorders: Overview

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Functional disorders involve physical symptoms that hinder your child’s  everyday routine and that cannot be fully explained by a physical condition. Learn more about functional disorders and how best to assess and manage them.

​Key points

  • Functional disorders involve physical symptoms that get in the way of your child's everyday routine and that cannot be fully explained by a physical condition.
  • See a health-care provider if your child's symptoms cause them to miss school or activities.
  • Your child may experience stress with their physical symptoms if they cannot keep up with their peers and gain normal independence.
  • Functional symptoms are not unexplained or a mystery—they arise from a unique combination of biological, psychological, and social factors in each child.
  • Assessing biological, psychological and social factors to manage physical symptoms gives the best opportunity for recovery.

When a physical condition cannot be found to fully explain your child’s physical symptoms, the symptoms might be described as:

  • functional
  • non-organic
  • amplified
  • medically unexplained
  • psychosomatic
  • psychogenic
  • pseudo (for example, pseudoseizures)
  • somatization (expressing distress through physical symptoms)

A health-care provider may also use these terms when a child with an existing medical condition has symptoms that:

  • are more severe, and have a greater impact on their daily life, than would be expected with the medical condition;
  • cannot be entirely explained by the medical condition.

Functional disorders hinder your child’s everyday routine. For example, they can make it difficult for your child to dress, bathe, feed themselves, move around, go to school consistently or do activities with family and friends.

Common symptoms include headaches, nausea, recurring stomach pain and tiredness. These symptoms occur in up to 40 per cent of children and teens. They can be even more common in children with medical illnesses, where the exact cause is harder to figure out.

Last updated: June 2nd 2025