http://www.hindu.com/2007/11/11/stories/2007111161590300.htm
Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
BANGALORE: Did you know that Michael Jackson suffers from something called body dysmorphic disorder which explains his pre-occupation with the way he looks and the innumerable surgeries he has reputedly undergone? And that nose-picking and skin-picking are signs of obsessive compulsive behaviour in some people?
These and other interesting facts about obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) were discussed at the two-day international conference on "Obsessive Compulsive Disorder: Current Understanding and Future Directions" hosted by the Department of Psychiatry at the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS) inaugurated here on Saturday.
The conference was inaugurated by R.M. Verma, Founder-Director of NIMHANS, and D. Nagaraja, Director and Vice-Chancellor, NIMHANS, was among those present.
Dan Stein, Chair, Department of Psychiatry, University of Cape Town, South Africa, said that there was good evidence to suggest that OCD was not uncommon, that it was mediated by particular psychobiological mechanisms and responded to both psychotherapy and medicines.
Recent advances in this area of psychiatry indicated that there were different types of compulsive and obsessive behaviours that purely do not classify as OCD but may in future be categorised as OCD spectrum disorders.
What is OCD?
It is a disorder characterised by obsessions, which are in the form of recurrent and persistent thoughts or images that are perceived as intrusive and inappropriate and compulsions are repetitive, unwanted behaviour. As much as one to two per cent of the population may have some form of OCD.
The most common types of OCD include 1. Fear of dirt and contamination.
Patients frequently fear that they may contract a disease or spread a disease because of exposure to contaminants.
The fear may occasionally be based on a subjective feeling of not being clean enough. For example, they may not touch doorknobs or light switches or other objects touched by others.
The cleaning compulsions include excessive or ritualised hand washing, showering, bathing and elaborate toilet routines.
2. Sexual or aggressive obsessions. These could be in the form of intrusive sexual thoughts/images about family members or the fear that they may harm loved ones through impulsive behaviour.
3. Repetitive behaviour. Some patients may repeat certain gestures and activities again and again such as putting a switch on and off continuously and checking things repeatedly before leaving home.
4. Hoarding. In such cases, people have difficulty getting rid of things and hoard them to the point that they create a clutter.
Some forms of OCD can take on extreme and bizarre proportions. According to David Mataix-Cols, senior lecturer, Institute of Psychiatry, King's College, London, disorders such as compulsive hoarding, when it exceeds all limits, can be devastating for the patient's family and detrimental to the health of the patient.
"Some patients hoard rotten food. We had examined an extreme case of a 60-year-old woman who was hoarding her own faeces.
She did not have any other psychotic behaviour, but the explanation she gave was that her identity was linked with her waste products and if she flushed it down, her identity would be lost."
Tanveer
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