Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-fbnjt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-19T07:18:08.117Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Schizophreniform Psychosis with Chronic Brucellosis

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 January 2018

P. T. Annesley*
Affiliation:
Hereford Hospital Group

Extract

It has long been recognized that chronic brucellosis may present as a psychoneurotic illness, and this is well emphasized by Spink (1963) in Cecil and Loeb's Textbook of Medicine. However, presentation in the form of a psychosis is rare, and this is not mentioned in Spink's article, nor in a standard psychiatric textbook such as Mayer-Gross, Slater and Roth (1954). Dalrymple-Champneys (1960) described a series of 1,500 cases of brucellosis; only two of his patients had delusions and hallucinations. Hobbs (1931) described the case of a woman of 56 who developed delusions of persecution and believed her food to be poisoned. This latter symptom was also shown by one of the patients in Dalrymple-Champneys' series, and the same complaint occurred in my patient. Although a very rare cause of paranoid illness, the recognition of brucellosis is important so that appropriate treatment can be instituted.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal College of Psychiatrists, 1968 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Dalrymple-Champneys, Sir W. (1960). Brucella Infection and Undulant Fever in Man. London: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Mayer-Gross, W., Slater, E., and Roth, M. (1954). Clinical Psychiatry. London: Cassell.Google Scholar
Hobbs, F. B. (1931). Lancet, ii, 683.Google Scholar
Spink, W. W. (1963). In Cecil and Loeb's Textbook of Medicine. Philadelphia: W. B. Saunders.Google Scholar
Submit a response

eLetters

No eLetters have been published for this article.