Cotard Syndrome Associated to Major Depressive Disorder with Catatonic Symptoms. Case report

Abstract

Introduction: Catatonia is a neuropsychiatric syndrome with abnormal postures, mutism and stupor. Colombia has a prevalence of 11.4% of psychiatric patients. Objective: To discuss the clinical curse of a 34-year-old woman with major depressive disorder that presents to emergency department with nihilistic delirium and catatonic symptoms. Case presentation: A young woman with history of unipolar major depression with psychotic features was hospitalized nine months ago. She was medicated with a nonspecific medical treatment. At the admission the patient had three days of bizarre behavior, mutism and negativism. Paraclinics and brain computer tomography didn’t report any abnormality or changes. Treatment began with benzodiazepine, which achieved full remission of catatonic symptoms. After this, she developed anhedonia, sadness and nihilistic delusions and was considered as a relapse of a previous depressive episode from nine months ago, associated with Cotard’s syndrome. Sertraline was added with gradual increase to 100mg and 5mg of olanzapine, getting a complete remission of psychotic and mood symptoms. Discussion: Affective disorders are most common cause of catatonia. There has already been a history of similar reports, but in few times this three entities were associated; this is the first case reported in Hospital Universitario de Santander, with informed consent.  Conclusions: It is unusual for a depressed patient to present denial delusions and catatonic symptoms simultaneously; therefore this case is unusual and may contribute to literature. The catatonic symptoms make it difficult to explore other mental spheres, though they may be secondary to a medical condition, therefore, it is essential to dismiss organic pathologies and give initial treatment, so we can discover the underlying etiopsychopathology. [Torrado-Arenas DM, Santos-Gutiérrez KE, Ruiz-Higuera SM, Zabala-Arias LM, Niño-García JA. Cotard’s syndrome associated to major depressive disorder with catatonic symptoms. Case report. MedUNAB 2016;18(1):76-80].