(6 Giugno 2014) La rivista internazionale International Neuropsychiatric Disease Journal ha accettato per la pubblicazione un articolo che discute una sindrome particolare, la sindrome di Cotard, che si caratterizza da sintomi depressivi, deliri nichilistici e di colpa. L'articolo è firmato da Giampaolo Perna e un gruppo di ricercatori provenienti da varie università e ospedali psichiatrii italiani

Il titolo dell'articolo è "Cotard's syndrome: clinical case presentation and literature review" che ha come autori: Alessandro Carano, Domenico de Berardis, Marilde Cavuto, Carla Ortolani, Giampaolo Perna, Alessandro Valchera, Monica Mazza, Michele Fornaro, Felici Iasevoli, Giovanni Martinotti e Massimo Di Giannantonio.  

Abstract

In 1880 French neurologist Jules Cotard described a condition characterized by delusion of negation (nihilistic delusion) in a melancholia context. Recently, there has been aresurgence of interest in Cotard’s syndrome. The most prominent symptoms of Cotard’s Syndrome are depressive mood, nihilistic delusions concerning one’s own body and one’s own existence, delusions of guilt, immortality and hypochondria. The aim of the present paper is to review literature evidences concerning Cotard’s syndrome and to describe a clinical case keeping in the background the recent trends on its psychopathological implications. In the clinical study, the following sequence of stages emerged: the dissociative side, expressed as a loss of body-mind cohesion; the ‘mixed’ mood disorder, with depressive-manic episodes, and a persecutory background, all coexisting in the anguish of the idea of a body falling apart, the anguish of a descent
towards the abyss of melancholia and/or an ascent to unlimited euphoria, characteristic of an “uncommon alarm” for loss of Self cohesion.