Psychotic Symptoms in the Patients with Senile Dementia

Lee, Hyung Yung; Lee, Soo In

Abstract

Psychotic symptoms in demented patients cause significant distress to both families and caregivers. The purpose of this study was to investigate the frequency and nature of psychotic symptoms in demented elderly patients, and to explore whether socio-demographic characteristics, duration of illness, MMSE-K scores, and BPRS scores are associated with psychotic symptoms. The subjects were 62 demented elderly inpatients who met the criteria of the DSM-IV for dementia. Psychotic symptoms were classified into 3 categories such as paranoid delusions, misidentification syndromes, and hallucinations by the criteria of Rubin et al. The frequency and nature of psychotic symptoms and the differences in age, gender, education level, marital status, duration of illness, MMSE-K scores, and BPRS scores according to the presence of psychotic symptoms were investigated. The severity of dementia was divided into mild/moderate and severe demented by the criteria of Cooper et al. and the association between the severity of dementia and psychotic symptoms was examined. 1) Of the 62 demented patients, 40 patients (64.5%) showed psychotic symptoms: 25 patients (40.3%) showed paranoid delusions, 21 patients (33.8%) misidentification syndromes, and 8 patients (12.9%) hallucinations. 2) There were no significant differences between demented patients with and without psychotic symptoms in age, gender, education level, marital status, duration of illness, and severity of dementia. BPRS scores were significantly higher in demented patients with psychotic symptoms than demented patients without psychotic symptoms (t=4.36, p<.001). 3) Psychotic symptoms were not significant difference between mild/moderate and severe demented patients. Psychotic symptoms were common in demented elderly patients. Among the psychotic symptoms, paranoid delusions were more commonly observed. Psychotic symptoms were not associated with age, gender, education level, marital status, duration of illness, and severity of dementia but were associated with BPRS scores.