What is catatonic behavior?

Catatonia is a disorder that disrupts a person's awareness of the world around them. People with this condition sometimes react very little or not at all to their surroundings, or might behave in ways that are unusual, unexpected or unsafe to themselves or others.

What is an example of catatonic behavior?

There are three main forms of catatonia: excited, withdrawn and mixed. Excited/hyperkinetic: This form involves increased movement (such as in the form of pacing), agitated behavior, unusual or exaggerated movements, repetitive movements or speaking, or mimicking someone speaking or moving near them.

What are the 12 symptoms of catatonia?

These symptoms include stupor, catalepsy, waxy flexibility, mutism, negativism, posturing, mannerisms, stereotypy, agitation not influenced by external stimuli, grimacing, echolalia, and echopraxia. At least three of these symptoms must be present for the diagnosis of catatonia.

Do catatonic patients talk?

Additional catatonic signs involving speech production are verbigeration and echolalia and are essentially characterized by repetition of words or phrases that are devoid of inherent meaning.

What triggers a catatonic episode?

Schizophrenia and other psychiatric disorders such as mania and depression are known to be associated with catatonia; however, several case reports have been published of certain medical conditions inducing catatonia, including hyponatremia, cerebral venous sinus thrombosis, and liver transplantation.

Catatonia: Bridging the Gap Between Psychiatry and Neurology

Can someone come out of a catatonic state?

Doctors usually treat catatonia with a kind of sedative called a benzodiazepine that's often used to ease anxiety. Another treatment option is electroconvulsive therapy (ECT). It sends electrical impulses to the person's brain through electrodes placed on their head.

How long does a catatonic state last?

Catatonia can last anywhere from a few hours to weeks, months or even years. Some people have reoccuring episodes.

How do you help someone in a catatonic state?

Doctors often prescribe benzodiazepines as the first-line treatment for catatonia. Benzodiazepines, such as lorazepam (Ativan), have anxiety-relieving and muscle-relaxing properties. A doctor can administer the medication intravenously if a person cannot take it orally.

Can anxiety cause catatonia?

Catatonia is often a presentation of extreme anxiety and depression. Missing the diagnosis of catatonia would lead to improper treatment, which could be life-threatening.

What causes death in a catatonic person?

Recognizing and treating catatonia usually results in rapid resolution of the syndrome, whereas failing to recognize it may lead to potentially fatal complications including infection, neuroleptic malignant syndrome, and pulmonary embolism.

What drugs cause catatonia?

Drug-induced catatonia has mostly been reported with psychotropic drugs, including fluphenazine, haloperidol, risperidone, and clozapine, non-psychotropic drugs such as steroids, disulfiram, ciprofloxacin, several benzodiazepines, as well as drugs of abuse, including phencyclidine, cannabis, mescaline, LSD, cocaine and ...

What happens if catatonia is not treated?

If catatonia is left unrecognized and untreated it becomes chronic, and patients may die from complications of malnutrition, immobility, and/or dangerous behavior. The DSM-IV does recognize that catatonia is frequently associated with medical illnesses and carries a significant morbidity and mortality.

Is catatonia a mental illness?

Prominent researchers in the field have other suggestions for diagnostic criteria. The DSM-5 does not classify catatonia as an independent disorder, but rather it classifies it as catatonia associated with another mental disorder, due to another medical condition, or as unspecified catatonia.

Is catatonia caused by trauma?

There seem to be two types or constructs of conditioning that predispose an individual to catatonic symptoms in response to traumatic events: external conditioning (e.g., external environment) and internal conditioning (e.g., flashbacks or nightmares).

What is Echopraxia?

Echopraxia, also known as “echomotism,” is the involuntary repetition of another person's movements or actions. A person with this symptom may mimic your hand gestures during a conversation or copy how you walk.

What is a catatonic person aware of?

Most people who have catatonia are at least somewhat aware of the world around them. They simply can't react to what's happening around them as they would normally. It's also common for people with catatonia to remember some of what happened to them even though they seemed unaware.

Can a person be cured of catatonia?

Prompt treatment of catatonia with benzodiazepines or electroconvulsive therapy (ECT), as well as treatment of the underlying cause, generally leads to remission of catatonia. However, failure to recognize and properly treat catatonia can lead to poor outcomes; malignant catatonia in particular can be fatal.

Is catatonia a form of dissociation?

The average score on the BFCS was 7.7 (SD = 10.3); 81 participants scored 2 or higher, and 67 scored 5 or higher. The results showed that, in this sample, catatonic symptoms are frequent and related to adverse childhood experiences but seem to be a separate symptom category from both dissociation and psychosis.

How do you snap out of catatonia?

Electroconvulsive therapy (ECT)

This is a treatment where a person's brain is stimulated with short electric pulses while they are under general anaesthetic and asleep. A person may be prescribed a course of ECT over several weeks to help relieve their symptoms. ECT is very effective in treating catatonia.

Can you go catatonic from stress?

For example, a traumatic event or losing a loved one can cause mental trauma. As an outcome, the individual encounters extreme emotional stress, which causes him or her to enter a catatonic state.

Is catatonia brain damage?

Catatonia is often associated with brain imaging abnormalities (in more than 75% of cases). The majority of the case reports show diffuse lesions of white matter, in a wide range of brain regions. Most of the case reports of functional imaging usually show frontal, temporal, or basal ganglia hypoperfusion.

What can mimic catatonia?

The differential diagnostic should include illnesses that mimic catatonia, such as akinetic Parkinson disease, malignant hyperthermia, stiff-person syndrome, conversion disorder, selective mutism (selective mutism is a social anxiety disorder in which people who can speak normally in some situations cannot speak in ...

Can alcohol cause catatonia?

Catatonia has been documented in alcohol dependence in relation to drug interactions involving disulfiram⁴ and in delirium. The temporal correlation between alcohol abstinence and the appearance of catatonia in the absence of these other causes suggests that the catatonia in this case was due to alcohol withdrawal.

What is the best medication for catatonia?

Benzodiazepines are the first-choice treatment for catatonia, regardless of the underlying condition. Benzodiazepines are positive allosteric modulators of GABA-A receptors and will correct deficient GABA-ergic function in the orbitofrontal cortex (11).