Psych News Report- Fregoli Syndrome

7/22/2019 Psych News Report- Fregoli Syndrome

1/15

PSY101 NEWS REPORTFregoli Syndrome

Submitted by:

Angela Abao

Miguel Benavides

Section E

Jan. 6, 2014


2/15

WHAT is Fregoli Syndrome?

- When a person holds

delusional belief that

different people are in fact a

single person in disguised

- Classed as monothematic

delusion and as a delusional

misidentification syndrome


3/15

Named after an Italian actor, Leopold Fregoli


4/15

Symptoms:

- Misidentifying unfamiliar people or places asfamiliar ones

- Visual-spatial perception and memory

impairments

- Prosopagnosia i.e. facial recognition impairment

- Violent behavior


5/15

Causes/ Etiology: Cognitive

- Paranoid schizophrenia

- Seizures - often associated

in many cases years after an

attack

- Epileptogenic activity

- Abnormal decision-making

or reasoning ability


6/15

- Psychosis with organic etiology (i.e. neurological

abnormalities)

- cortical atrophy in frontal and temporal areas (i.e. tissue

degradation on the outer foldings of the brain)

- damage to the occipital-temporal area leading to visual

spatial perception and memory impairments

- bifrontal/ right hemisphere lesions leading to facialrecognition impairment

- hyperfamiliarity - overactivity in right perirhinal cortex

Causes/ Etiology: Cognitive


7/15

Causes/ Etiology: Psychodynamic- Ambivalence theory - ambivalent feelings toward the supposed

imposter manifest as denial and displacement;

- Depersonalization/derealization theory - affected patients

perceive their environment and their bodies in an unusual way

that is experienced more strongly with objects or people theyhave strong affinities for.

- Regression theory - a compromise in higher brain function

leads to a return to primitive modes of thinking characterized

by themes of doubles and dualisms usually found in myth,primitive religion, and literature.


8/15

Comorbidities- Intermetamorphosis - patients believe they see people

change physically and personally

- Affective disorders (i.e. dramatic mood changes)

- Capgras syndrome

- Syndrome of subjective doubles - the delusional belief that

physical duplicates of the self exist but with their own

psychological identities

- Erotomania - the delusional belief that one is loved by

someone else


9/15

Treatment- A typical Antipsychotics such as olanzapine, sulpiride,

quetiapine

- Anticonvulsant and Antidepressants

- Treatment often use trifluperazine if other

psychological disorders are present


10/15

Case 1: Mr. A (21 yrs. old)

- he believed that his facial cream strongly attractsfemale students and that it perfects his looks

- He spent a lot of time in Facebook, where he met

a young woman whom he want to have anintimate relationship with but the woman

withdrew

- He developed a belief that every time a woman

would contact her in Facebook, it was the same

woman from before whos just disguising herself.


11/15

Case 2: Mr. F (37 yrs. old)

- special case of Fregoli because the copy of the own mind is

believed to inhabit the body of others

- complained about hearing voices which caused him to feel

fearful of others.

- When he was arrested, he believed that there are machines

in the jail that could copy ones brain, including his own

- He also believed that copies of his brain were place insidepeople whom he havent met before

- He identifies them through mannerisms that are similar to

his


12/15

Case 3: 22 yrs old Hungarian

- Met a woman in Hungary and thought that she loved him

after talking for a while

- Knowing that girls hometown and school, he went to

Germany to look for her

- Misidentified his neighbour's daughter as the woman he

was looking for (Fregoli Syndrome)

- Harassed the family and threatened her father


13/15

Case 3: 22 yrs old Hungarian

- Had delusions that the woman is dead and that the body is

hidden in the attic (Cotard Syndrome)

- In the hospital, he claimed to be someone else having German

origins rather than Hungarian

- Didnt recognized his original parents

- Thought that they were replaced by physically identical

persons (Capgrass Syndrome)


14/15

Bibliography

1. Yalin, ., Varol Ta, F., & Gunevr, T. (2008). The Coexistence of Capgras, Fregoliand Cotard's Syndromes in an Adolescent Case.Archives Of Neuropsychiatry /

Noropsikiatri Arsivi, 45(4), 149-151.

2. Silva, J. A., & Leong, G. B. (1991). A case of "subjective" Frgoli

syndrome.Journal of Psychiatry and Neuroscience, 16(2), 103

3. Phillips, M. L., & David, A. S. (1995). Facial processing in schizophrenia and

delusional misidentification: cognitive neuropsychiatric approaches.Schizophrenia

research, 17(1), 109-114.

4. Edelstyn, N. J., Riddoch, M. J., Oyebode, F. F., Humphreys, G. ., & Forde, E. E.

(1996). Visual Processing in Patients with Fregoli Syndrome. Cognitive

Neuropsychiatry, 1(2), 103-124. doi:10.1080/135468096396587

5. Hintzen, A., Wilhelm-Gling, C., & Garlipp, P. (2008). Combined DelusionalSyndromes in a Patient with Schizophrenia: Erotomania, Delusional

Misidentification Syndrome, Folie Deux and Nihilistic Delusion.Unverffentlichtes

Manuskript.


15/15

Bibliography

6. Delavenne, H., & Garcia, F. D. (2011). Fregoli syndrome associated with violentbehavior.J Bras Psiquiatr, 60(1), 67-70.

7. Devinsky, O., Davachi, L., Santchi, C., Quinn, B. T., Staresina, B. P., & Thesen, T.

(2010). Hyperfamiliarity for faces. Neurology, 74(12), 970-974.

8. Wright, S., Young, A. W., & Hellawell, D. J. (1993). Frgoli delusion and

erotomania.Journal of neurology, neurosurgery, and psychiatry, 56(3), 322.9. Jocic, M. D. (2011). Delusional misidentification syndromes.Jefferson Journal of

Psychiatry, 10(1), 4.

10. Physicians Postgraduate Press, Inc. (2012, January 26). A Contemporary Case

of Frgoli Syndrome. Retrieved from National Center for Biotechnology

Information: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3357570/

Documents

Psych News Report- Fregoli Syndrome