BMJ 1998;316:564-565 ( 21 February )

Editorials

Medically unexplained neurological symptoms

The risk of missing organic disease is low

See p 582

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

A psychological component exists in all illness, contributing a variable amount to the clinical presentation. At the benign end of this range are patients who describe their symptoms in more florid terms than seem to be justified. At the malignant end is malingering and the Munchausen syndrome. Between these extremes are a range of patients who present with non-organic signs or symptoms, with or without underlying neurological disease, usually called hysterical elaboration or hysterical conversion disorder.

Again a range of clinical presentation exists. If patients present with apparent non-organic signs or symptoms and are later found to have an underlying disease which might account for some or most of their original problems this is perceived as a hysterical elaboration of the underlying deficit. For example, a patient who seems to have a hysterical paraplegia might be found to have white matter changes on magnetic resonance imaging and oligoclonal bands in . . . [Full text of this article]
Add to CiteULike CiteULike   Add to Complore Complore   Add to Connotea Connotea   Add to Del.icio.us Del.icio.us   Add to Digg Digg   Add to Reddit Reddit   Add to StumbleUpon StumbleUpon   Add to Technorati Technorati   Add to Twitter Twitter    What's this?

Relevant Articles

Prognosis of symptoms that are medically unexplained
Michael Götz and Allan House
BMJ 1998 317: 536. [Extract] [Full Text] [PDF]

Slater revisited: 6 year follow up study of patients with medically unexplained motor symptoms
Helen L Crimlisk, Kailash Bhatia, Helen Cope, Anthony David, C David Marsden, and Maria A Ron
BMJ 1998 316: 582-586. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

This article has been cited by other articles:

  • Jacobson, L., Elwyn, G., Robling, M., Jones, R. T. (2003). Error and safety in primary care: no clear boundaries. Fam Pract 20: 237-241 [Abstract] [Full text]  
  • Peters, S., Stanley, I., Rose, M., Kaney, S., Salmon, P. (2002). A randomized controlled trial of group aerobic exercise in primary care patients with persistent, unexplained physical symptoms. Fam Pract 19: 665-674 [Abstract] [Full text]  
  • Gotz, M., House, A. (1998). Prognosis of symptoms that are medically unexplained. BMJ 317: 536-536 [Full text]  
Access jobs at BMJ Careers
Whats new online at Student BMJ