Neuroscience
Capgras syndrome – in which the patient believes their friends and relatives have been replaced by impersonators – was first described in 1923 by the French psychiatrist J.M.J. Capgras in a paper with J. Reboul-Lachaux.
Now Alireza Nejad and Khatereh Toofani at the Beheshti Hospital in Iran have reported an extremely rare variant of Capgras syndrome in which a 55-year-old woman with epilepsy believes her possessions have all been replaced by substitute objects that don’t belong to her. When she buys something new, she immediately feels that it has been replaced.
However, the authors reported “there was no evidence of dementia, her memory was intact, and her immediate, recent, and remote memories were okay. She was oriented to time, place and person, and had appropriate intelligence”. She also had no history of head injury or migraine, and brain scans revealed no gross abnormality.
The woman developed grandmal epilepsy when she was thirty. Then three months before her psychiatric referral, she had a seizure followed by the sensation that someone was following her. Then it was after her next seizure that she developed the delusional belief that all her things had been swapped. The authors can’t explain her delusion but believe it may be related to right-hemisphere frontal and temporal abnormalities. “No remarkable point was present in the patient’s history, and there was no psychosocial stress prior to her psychotic episode” they said.
__________________________________
Nejad, A.G. & Toofani, K. A variant of Capgras syndrome with delusional conviction of inanimate doubles in a patient with grandmal epilepsy. Acta Neuropsychiatrica, 18, 52-54.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
In another paper, a patient thought hospital staff were hired actors in a stage production. See Silva, J.A. et al. (1990). An unusual case of Capgras syndrome: the psychiatric ward as a stage. Psychiatric Journal of the University of Ottawa, 15, 44-46.
The classic paper: Capgras, J. & Reboul-Lachaux, J. (1923). Illusion des sosies dans un delire systematise chronique. Bulletin de la Societe Clinique de Medicine Mentale, 2, 6–16.
- The Man Who Saw A Stranger In The Mirror
The man was diagnosed with Capgras syndromeMirrors easily call forth the uncanny: the vampire that casts no reflection; the figure who seems to appear in your periphery. Overtired or in an odd mood, I sometimes find myself scrutinising my own reflection,...
- Capgras For Cats And Canaries
Capgras syndrome is the delusion that a familiar person has been replaced by a nearly identical duplicate. The imposter is usually a loved one or a person otherwise close to the patient. Originally thought to be a manifestation of schizophrenia and other...
- Cotard's Syndrome: Not Pretending That We're Dead
Playing dead game -- A craze called the "playing dead game" has swept this nation where people of all ages stage elaborate death scenes everyplace. Believing That We're Dead Cotard's Syndrome is the delusional belief that one is dead...
- Weird Psychiatric Disorder Day
This morning's brief movie capsule didn't explain either delusional parasitosis or folie à deux. Wikipedia says that Delusional parasitosis is a form of psychosis in which sufferers hold a delusional belief they are infested with parasites.Mind...
- Upcoming Event: Neurofest, Nyc, January 2006
Untitled Theater Company #61 explores the nexus of science and art in NEUROfest, the first-ever theater festival dedicated to neurological conditions. NEUROfest 5-29 January 2006 Theater 5 311 West 43rd Street, 5th floor Additional info: NEUROfest homepage...
Neuroscience
Who replaced all my things?
Capgras syndrome – in which the patient believes their friends and relatives have been replaced by impersonators – was first described in 1923 by the French psychiatrist J.M.J. Capgras in a paper with J. Reboul-Lachaux.Now Alireza Nejad and Khatereh Toofani at the Beheshti Hospital in Iran have reported an extremely rare variant of Capgras syndrome in which a 55-year-old woman with epilepsy believes her possessions have all been replaced by substitute objects that don’t belong to her. When she buys something new, she immediately feels that it has been replaced.
However, the authors reported “there was no evidence of dementia, her memory was intact, and her immediate, recent, and remote memories were okay. She was oriented to time, place and person, and had appropriate intelligence”. She also had no history of head injury or migraine, and brain scans revealed no gross abnormality.
The woman developed grandmal epilepsy when she was thirty. Then three months before her psychiatric referral, she had a seizure followed by the sensation that someone was following her. Then it was after her next seizure that she developed the delusional belief that all her things had been swapped. The authors can’t explain her delusion but believe it may be related to right-hemisphere frontal and temporal abnormalities. “No remarkable point was present in the patient’s history, and there was no psychosocial stress prior to her psychotic episode” they said.
__________________________________
Nejad, A.G. & Toofani, K. A variant of Capgras syndrome with delusional conviction of inanimate doubles in a patient with grandmal epilepsy. Acta Neuropsychiatrica, 18, 52-54.
Post written by Christian Jarrett (@psych_writer) for the BPS Research Digest.
In another paper, a patient thought hospital staff were hired actors in a stage production. See Silva, J.A. et al. (1990). An unusual case of Capgras syndrome: the psychiatric ward as a stage. Psychiatric Journal of the University of Ottawa, 15, 44-46.
The classic paper: Capgras, J. & Reboul-Lachaux, J. (1923). Illusion des sosies dans un delire systematise chronique. Bulletin de la Societe Clinique de Medicine Mentale, 2, 6–16.
- The Man Who Saw A Stranger In The Mirror
The man was diagnosed with Capgras syndromeMirrors easily call forth the uncanny: the vampire that casts no reflection; the figure who seems to appear in your periphery. Overtired or in an odd mood, I sometimes find myself scrutinising my own reflection,...
- Capgras For Cats And Canaries
Capgras syndrome is the delusion that a familiar person has been replaced by a nearly identical duplicate. The imposter is usually a loved one or a person otherwise close to the patient. Originally thought to be a manifestation of schizophrenia and other...
- Cotard's Syndrome: Not Pretending That We're Dead
Playing dead game -- A craze called the "playing dead game" has swept this nation where people of all ages stage elaborate death scenes everyplace. Believing That We're Dead Cotard's Syndrome is the delusional belief that one is dead...
- Weird Psychiatric Disorder Day
This morning's brief movie capsule didn't explain either delusional parasitosis or folie à deux. Wikipedia says that Delusional parasitosis is a form of psychosis in which sufferers hold a delusional belief they are infested with parasites.Mind...
- Upcoming Event: Neurofest, Nyc, January 2006
Untitled Theater Company #61 explores the nexus of science and art in NEUROfest, the first-ever theater festival dedicated to neurological conditions. NEUROfest 5-29 January 2006 Theater 5 311 West 43rd Street, 5th floor Additional info: NEUROfest homepage...