Sturge-Weber syndrome--a forgotten condition.
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We reviewed 7 cases with posterior fossa structural abnormalities (3 tumors, 2 megacisterna magna and 2 Dandy-Walker syndrome) presenting with neuropsychiatric symptomatology. Derangement in the balance of dopamine, serotonin and noradrenergic networks has been implicated in the pathogenesis of schizophrenia, affective and even personality disorders. Disruption of the cerebellar output to mesial dopaminergic areas, locus coeruleus and raphe nuclei, or deafferentation of the thalamolimbic circuits by a cerebellar lesion may lead to behavioral changes. Seven patients (pts) (comprising 4 men and 3 women with mean age 22 years) were diagnosed as suffering from psychosis (2 pts), major depression (1 pt), personality disorders (2 pts) and somatoform disorders (2 pts) (DSM-IV criteria). Brain CT scan (7 pts) and MRI (4 pts) revealed tumors of the posterior fossa (2 pts), megacisterna magna (2 pts) and Dandy-Walker variant (2 pts). In one patient a IVth ventricle tumor was removed in childhood.
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Phencyclidine (PCP) is a popular illicit drug often misrepresented as some other hallucinogenic substance and distributed in widely varying dosage forms and strengths. Users of hallucinogenic drugs may present with unintentional PCP overdoses. Toxicological laboratory analyses are essential to establish the diagnosis. In nine admitted overdose patients, the consciousness level ranged from alert to comatose on presentation, and all showed a prolonged recovery phase with agitation and toxic psychosis. Severe behavior disorder, paranoid ideation, and amnesia for the entire period of in-hospital stay are characteristic. In very high dose patients, shallow respiratory excursions and periods of apnoea and cyanosis coincided with generalized extensor spasm and spasm of neck muscles. Excessive bronchial secretions, gross ataxia, opisthotonic posturing, and grimacing occur. PCP toxic psychosis should be considered in drug-abusing patients presenting with schizophrenic-like symptoms, psychosis, or other bizarre behavior, whether or not they admit to taking PCP.
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A series of 100 consecutive admissions to a psychogeriatric unit in a large public psychiatric hospital is described. Fifty-four of these were readmissions. Most of the patients presented with moderate to severe acute psychiatric disorders, and many of these were admitted under detention orders. Their disorders were often readily treatable and most patients returned to their local communities in less than three weeks. Unexpectedly, only one-third of patients had a primary diagnosis of organic cerebral disorder, and few had received a diagnosis from the referring doctor. The principal reason for the referral of patients was that they were obviously severely disturbed and disturbing within their community. Patients who do not cause a disturbance may thus be underdiagnosed and their treatment unnecessarily compromised. The traditional system of health care seems to be working well and in the interests of these psychogeriatric patients and there is no evidence that radical changes are needed.
On the basis of a clinico-psychopathological study of 90 patients with the most frequently encountered forms of reactive conditions, the author eliminates the predilective clinical types of psychotraumatizing situations. The appearance of reactive depressions and neurasthenia is connected with stress situations and exhaustions. Obsessional neurotic states are connected with situations of disturbed habitual stereotypes while as hysteric states--with situations of infringement of egocentrism. Paranoical reactions appear in situations of a denial incompromissity.
The early recognition of dementia along with consideration of differential diagnosis and elucidation of its underlying causes is of paramount importance because many of these conditions are remediable, given proper diagnosis and adequate treatment. The purpose of this article is to emphasize possible alternatives to the grim sentence of slowly progressive irreversible deterioration of personality and intellect when the verdict of dementia is pronounced.
OBJECTIVE: To determine attitudes with regard to ethics in the practice of psychiatry in South Africa. DESIGN: Cross-sectional survey. METHOD: The study utilised clinical vignettes, with gender and race of the patient as potential modifying variables in diagnosis and management. Open-ended questions pertaining to potential abuses were included. SETTING AND SUBJECTS: Questionnaires were mailed to all practising psychiatrists in South Africa in 1993 and 1994. OUTCOME MEASURES: Responses to questionnaire. RESULTS: A 40% response rate was obtained (N = 73). Patient race and gender did not influence diagnosis or have a marked impact on the prescription of treatment. Pressure from the patient's family on the psychiatrist did alter case management, as did the psychiatrist's age and gender in some instances. Racial discrimination, sexual misconduct and economic abuses were the most frequently cited areas of observed abuse. CONCLUSION: The development of an ethical framework for the practice of psychiatry in South Africa would appear to be of critical importance.
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The author studied the genetical traits in 2 groups of probands with attack-like schizophrenia with corresponding sex and age. The 1st group (62 probands) consisted of cases where the average age of the manifest psychoses was 59.5. The second group consisted of cases with an average of the manifest psychoses of 30.9. It appeared that the morbidity risk for schizophrenia for all the relatives of the first degree of relationship in the families of patients with late attack-like schizophrenia is significantly lower than the morbidity risk in familiies with an onset in young age. At the same time the frequency of schizophrenia among the relatives of patients with late attack-like schizophrenia significantly exceeds the frequency of schizophrenia in the general population. An accumulation of psychoses of a different nozology was not observed. The frequency of schizophrenia among the parents and sibs in a late manifestation of the disease in the probands is lower than in early schizophrenia. These differences were not seen in the children. Among the relatives of patients with late and early attack-like schizophrenia there is a large amount of schizoid personality anomalies.
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In the study of impediments to the success of psychoanalysis as a treatment method, the character structure of the analysand has received the most attention. Psychoanalysis has come to be used for the treatment of an ever-widening range of psychopathological states, and the analysts have become confronted with a greater incidence and variety of clinical situations which can develop into therapeutic obstacles. Whether the psychoanalytic impasse will become a therapeutic stepping-stone or an obstacle to treatment often depends upon the emotional response of the therapist and his resultant behavior. Accordingly, there has been a heightened interest in the study of countertransference. Some therapists equate the psychoanalytic treatment of patients with severe character deformations with "wild" analysis and therefore feel needless guilt and anxiety when they attemtp to treat patients who suffer from them; thus they increase the likelihood of their becoming therapeutic obstacles. We have considered the psychoanalytic impasse as an inevitable aspect of the analytic sequence and discussed countertransference reactions in this context. Technical complications resulting from adverse countertransference reactions are examined both in terms of the patient's provocations and responses in the analyst. Among the analyst's responses, three were emphasized: (1) helpless fellings which represent the patient's helplessness and vulnerability; (2) rage reactions; and (3) profound anxiety reactions. The patient's need to construct and environment similar to the early traumatic environment within the analysis can become a very difficult situation for a therapist. The resolution or at least understanding of these interactions becomes equivalent to the lifting of infantile amnesia, a step which has been considered the essence of psychoanalytic resolution. Thus, adverse reactions can become keys to the gaining of fundamental insights, permitting the analytic process to continue its inevitable course.
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Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) is an important therapeutic modality in geriatric patients because its safety, high efficacy and rapid onset of action are suited to the special needs of this population. It appears that ECT can be effective in the acute treatment of depression, mania, paranoid disorders and various psychiatric syndromes occurring in the context of brain disease. Certain cardiovascular and neurological disorders or use of drugs increase the risk of ECT in geriatric patients. Clinical strategies for evaluating and reducing the ECT risk in such cases are presented and directions for future clinical research are discussed.
Referring to a previous clinical and sociopsychiatric investigation on 130 foreign workers, the transcultural psychiatric factors determining forms and contents were studied. It is stressed that remains of magic thinking and rigid tribe-centered sociocultural structures are the main factors, in addition to the beginning of the loosening of these structures accompanied by initial assimiltion of occidental ways of life in the homeland, and integrational crises through collision of Old and New after immigration. Atypical psychosis, outweighting affective and somatic factors, obliteration of the limits between classic etiological units, and the possibility of confounding magic contents with psychosis are illustrated by case histories. New criteria for diagnosis and therapy of foreign workers are suggested.