GANSER SYNDROME

  • Rare dissociative disorder that has characteristic symptoms of nonsense or wrong answers to questions or doing things wrong, other dissociative symptoms such as fugue, amnesia or conversion disorder, often with visual pseudohallucinations and a lowered state of consciousness.
  • Other names: balderdash syndrome, nonsense syndrome, syndrome of approximate answers, pseudodementia, hysterical pseudodementia, prison psychosis.
  • Very rare variant of dissociative disorder.
  • A reaction to extreme stress and sometimes be diagnosed as malingering.
  • May present with symptoms like:
    • Clouding of consciousness
    • Domatic conversion symptoms
    • Confusion
    • Stress
    • Loss of personal identity
    • Echolalia
    • Echopraxia
  • Persons may also give approximate answers to easy questions.
  • May also happen in persons with other mental disorders.
    • Such as depressive disorders, schizophrenia,, paresis, toxic states, alcohol use disorders and factitious disorders.

DIAGNOSIS

  • No longer reconginzed as a separate disease entity in DSM-V and falls under “dissociative disorder NOS”.
  • Difficult to diagnose due to chance of dishonesty during questioning and rarity of condition.

 

RECOMMENDED MEDICATIONS

  • Hospitalization – acute phase
  • Psychiatric care
  • Neurologic consult

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