Table 2.

Selected verbatim descriptions of diabetic gastroparesis symptoms reported or endorsed by 60% or more of pretreatment interview participants (n = 73)

Symptom	Verbatim statements
Bloating/distention	I have bloat all the time. All the time. Yep, it’s like my stomach swell up like, kind of look like you’re pregnant, you know? It’s just like it’s swollen…. It feels, it’s very uncomfortable. Some days it’s not as bad as others, and then when it’s really bloated, distended, and hard, it’s really uncomfortable, because your stomach is tight Well, that’s more of the bloating…so full that you can hardly move, and that’s when I feel like my stomach is really pushed out there and really at its limits
Stomach fullness	I can’t eat well. I get full real easy.… And I feel fullness all day long. Like, I ate this morning, but I still feel the food in my stomach I also have a feeling like a fullness even sometimes up into like almost my heart area.… I mean sometimes I just feel like I’ve got to take that off, take my bra off and try to breathe…at the end of the day, I feel like I’m about to bust open [How would you describe a worsening of stomach fullness?] A 10. Sometimes it’s a full feeling, and sometimes it’s just not being interested in what I’m eating. Like the thought of eating makes me sick.… [Is that related to the fullness?] Yes
Early satiety	Typically, on my plate I may eat a tablespoon of peas and mashed potatoes, and I may even have not even a fourth [of a] piece of meat, and I’m done Well, frankly I don’t know how to describe it other than when you eat a big meal, you feel really full. That happens to me when I eat a very small meal After I have a few bites, it feels like…I had too much to eat when I know I’ve just had a few bites
Postprandial fullness	If I sit down to eat like, you know, you’ll have a salad, you’ll have a vegetable and you’ll have a meat and a drink. If I combined all of that together and I eat all of that, then say like 20 minutes or something like that, I am miserable afterwards It’s a very uncomfortable feeling, you feel really stuffed. And then you start burping a lot like your body is trying to make room
Nausea	Like, I feel sick that I want to throw up and really can’t function because I’m that sick I try to eat something small, and just like one bite, sometimes I take one bite and have to head straight to the bathroom to get rid of it to throw it up. I could take a bite of something and just have the nausea happen all of a sudden When I’m feeling nauseous, I know I’m going to throw up. And it’s not like reflux or anything like that. I can tell the difference.… Higher up in my stomach, you know, I just know something is there that I’m going to throw up
Vomiting	I couldn’t hold any food down. It would go down and it would just stay there and stay there and stay there until finally I would just go and throw it up Well, I just had a queasy feeling in my upper stomach and it feels like, you know, the feeling is rising upward and I open my mouth and things come out When you’re throwing up food that’s just sitting in your stomach or food that hasn’t digested
Abdominal pain/discomfort	Almost every day, you know, after I eat my stomach gets hard. It hurts. It felt like somebody was just sticking you with something. I mean sticking a knife in your gut, and then at just other times it felt like an open wound, that burning feeling that it gets Top part of my stomach and in the middle part of my stomach by my navel. It feel like sharp pains, like needle pains And in my upper abdominal area, like maybe around my diaphragm or whatever, I just kind of have a dull pain there at all times.… It’s like, and again I’ll say, in my diaphragm area and that high up, it feels heavy like there’s a weight, you know
Loss of appetite	[Can you describe a worsening of your fullness?] Having no appetite at all. No appetite. Taking one bite and being done. Eating chicken nuggets or something like that [inaudible] two or three of them and I’m done. I’m just done I just feel really heavy and I hurt when I try to eat something or drink something else when I be feeling full like that. I can’t. Even if I feel, per se, hungry, I can’t put more in. I have to just stop

Quotations were identified by participant number (not presented here).