Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of case descriptions
- Preface
- Part I Delusional disorders and delusions: introductory aspects
- Part II Descriptive and clinical aspects of paranoia/delusional disorder
- Part III ‘Paranoid spectrum’ illnesses which should be included in the category of delusional disorder
- Part IV Illnesses which are liable to be misdiagnosed as delusional disorders
- 11 Reactive and cycloid psychoses: the acute and transient psychotic disorders
- 12 Non-psychotic disorders which may simulate delusional disorders
- Part V Treatment of delusional disorder and overall conclusions
- Index
11 - Reactive and cycloid psychoses: the acute and transient psychotic disorders
from Part IV - Illnesses which are liable to be misdiagnosed as delusional disorders
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 November 2009
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of case descriptions
- Preface
- Part I Delusional disorders and delusions: introductory aspects
- Part II Descriptive and clinical aspects of paranoia/delusional disorder
- Part III ‘Paranoid spectrum’ illnesses which should be included in the category of delusional disorder
- Part IV Illnesses which are liable to be misdiagnosed as delusional disorders
- 11 Reactive and cycloid psychoses: the acute and transient psychotic disorders
- 12 Non-psychotic disorders which may simulate delusional disorders
- Part V Treatment of delusional disorder and overall conclusions
- Index
Summary
Introduction
In this chapter dealing with illnesses which present as psychotic episodes, two separate classes of disorder will be considered. These are:
Brief psychotic disorder (DSMIV) whose counterpart in ICD10 is ‘acute and transient psychotic disorder’, and which I shall discuss shortly under the heading of ‘reactive psychosis’.
Cycloid psychosis, which currently does not have official diagnostic status.
It may be asked why relatively detailed consideration is being given to these two illness types in a book on delusional disorders. The pertinent answer is that, in both illnesses, the acute presentation of a case may be mistaken for some form of delusional disorder, and quite often is.
If brief psychotic disorder and cycloid psychosis were clearly defined and widely accepted entities, a relatively succinct reference to them as differential diagnoses would suffice. Unfortunately, even though the former is described in DSMIV and ICD10, there is a surprising degree of uncertainty about its specific characteristics. The latter diagnosis is simply unfamiliar to many English-speaking psychiatrists, partly because of its absence from official diagnostic schemata. So, in clinical work, one finds much confusion in differentiating between acute and transient psychoses and periodic or cycloid psychoses on the one hand, and distinguishing, on the other hand, between either of these categories and the other major psychotic disorders, including delusional disorders.
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- Information
- Delusional DisorderParanoia and Related Illnesses, pp. 195 - 208Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1999