Dissociative disorder

Neonatal opioid withdrawal syndrome (NOWS) is a growing public health concern. The complexity of in utero opioid exposure in clinical studies makes it difficult to investigate underlying mechanisms that could ultimately inform early diagnosis and treatments. Clinical studies are unable to dissociate the influence of maternal polypharmacy or the environment from direct effects of in utero opioid exposure, highlighting the need for effective animal models. Early animal models of prenatal opioid exposure primarily used the prototypical opioid, morphine, and opioid exposure that was often limited to a narrow period during gestation...

BACKGROUND: Identifying covert consciousness in intensive care unit (ICU) patients with coma and other disorders of consciousness (DoC) is crucial for treatment decisions, but sensitive low-cost bedside markers are missing. We investigated whether automated pupillometry combined with passive and active cognitive paradigms can detect residual consciousness in ICU patients with DoC. METHODS: We prospectively enrolled clinically low-response or unresponsive patients with traumatic or nontraumatic DoC from ICUs of a tertiary referral center...

Cognitive motor dissociation (CMD) is characterized by a dissociation between volitional brain responses and motor control, detectable only through techniques such as electroencephalography (EEG) and functional magnetic resonance imaging. Hence, it has recently emerged as a major challenge in the assessment of patients with disorders of consciousness. Specifically, this review focuses on the prognostic implications of CMD detection during the acute stage of brain injury. CMD patients were identified in each diagnostic category (coma, unresponsive wakefulness syndrome/vegetative state, minimally conscious state minus) with a relatively similar prevalence of around 20%...

PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Physical pain is an underrecognized area of dysregulation among those with borderline personality disorder (BPD). Disturbances are observed within the experience of acute, chronic, and everyday physical pain experiences for people with BPD. We aimed to synthesize research findings on multiple areas of dysregulation in BPD in order to highlight potential mechanisms underlying the association between BPD and physical pain dysregulation. RECENT FINDINGS: Potential biological mechanisms include altered neural responses to painful stimuli within cognitive-affective regions of the brain, as well as potentially low basal levels of endogenous opioids...

Prolonged incest, where children are sexually abused by familial perpetrators into adulthood, has been documented in clinical and criminological scholarship, however it is often overlooked in research, policy and practice approaches to familial sexual abuse. This article draws on interviews with ten Australian therapists about their clinical work with clients subject to incestuous abuse continuing into adulthood. It outlines their descriptions of these cases, the nature of the reported abuse and factors that facilitated prolonged and ongoing incest, including at the time of therapy...

Ganglioside GM1 is a class of glycolipids predominantly located in the nervous system. Comprising a ceramide anchor and an oligosaccharide chain containing sialic acid, GM1 plays a pivotal role in various cellular processes, including signal transduction, cell adhesion, and membrane organization. Moreover, GM1 has been implicated in the pathogenesis of several neurological disorders, such as Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease, and stroke. In this study, by creating a neural cell model membrane simulation system and employing rigorous molecular models, we utilize a coarse-grained molecular dynamics approach to explore the structural and dynamic characteristics of multi-component neuronal plasma membranes at varying GM1 ganglioside concentrations...

BACKGROUND: This study aims to conduct the first-ever evaluation of our previously proposed behaviors of "hemomania" in individuals engaged with nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI). METHODS: The study encompassed 130 outpatients engaged with NSSI who applied at the psychiatry outpatient clinic. NSSI behaviors were assessed using the Inventory of Statements About Self-Injury, while psychiatric diagnoses were evaluated using the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-5 Disorders-Clinician Version...

Non-Verbal Learning Disability (NVLD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by deficits in processing visuospatial information but with age-appropriate verbal skills. This cognitive profile has been hypothesized to be associated with atypical white matter, but at the present there is a lack of evidence for this hypothesis. Currently, the condition is not characterized within the main diagnostic systems, in part because no clear set of criteria for characterizing the disorder exists. This report is the first attempt to estimate NVLD prevalence, using two sets of diagnostic criteria, in a large sample of over 11,000 children who were selected without regards to problems of specific nature, either psychological, neurological, physical and/or social...

Despite a theory that an imbalance in goal-directed versus habitual systems serve as building blocks of compulsions, research has yet to delineate how it occurs during an arbitration process between the two systems in obsessive-compulsive disorder. Inspired by a brain model that the inferior frontal cortex selectively gates the putamen to guide goal-directed or habitual actions, this study aimed to examine whether disruptions in the arbitration process via the fronto-striatal circuit would underlie the imbalanced decision-making and compulsions in patients...

BACKGROUND: Despite the pervasiveness of patient-reported emptiness and the high burden it carries, emptiness is poorly understood. In the current study, we used a general inductive approach to examine experiences with emptiness in a diagnostically diverse sample of treatment-seeking patients with severe and acute psychopathology. As a secondary aim, we also examined whether identified themes differed among patients with a primary diagnosis of borderline personality disorder or major depressive disorder...

Complex posttraumatic stress disorder (CPTSD) is a term representing the psychopathological implications of exposure to chronic, inter-personal trauma. These include the main symptoms of PTSD, as well as changes in identity, emotion regulation, and inter-personal relationships. Self-harm and dissociation (i.e., disintegration of mental processes) are also quite common in CPTSD. Considering this complex and often severe clinical picture, mental health professionals often find it difficult to effectively treat CPTSD...

BACKGROUND AND OBJECTIVE: Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS) has been found to have some interesting association with vaccinations. This paper mainly focuses on exploring different associations between COVID-19 vaccination and GBS. METHODS: Electronic databases such as PubMed, Google Scholar, Cochrane, and Embase were searched using MESH terms for case reports published till 1 August 2023 from which 70 case reports were documented involving 103 individuals from 23 different countries...

OBJECTIVE: Explore relationships of acute dissociative effects of intravenous ketamine with change in depression and suicidal ideation and with plasma metabolite levels in a randomized, midazolam-controlled trial. METHOD: Data from a completed trial in suicidal, depressed participants (N=40) randomized to ketamine was used to examine relationships between ketamine treatment-emergent dissociative and psychotomimetic symptoms with pre/post-infusion changes in suicidal ideation and depression severity...

BACKGROUND: Electrophysiologic measures provide an opportunity to inform mechanistic models and possibly biomarker prediction of response. Serotonergic psychedelics (SPs) (i.e., psilocybin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD)) and ketamine represent new investigational and established treatments in mood disorders respectively. There is a need to better characterize the mechanism of action of these agents. METHODS: We conducted a systematic review investigating the spectral signatures of psilocybin, LSD, and ketamine in persons with major depressive disorder (MDD), treatment-resistant depression (TRD), and healthy controls...

A 63-year-old man with type 2 diabetes mellitus, alcohol consumption in moderation, and three episodes of hepatic encephalopathy presented with symmetrical lower limb distal weakness, sensory ataxia, thickened palpable nerves, mood disturbances for seven years, and a family history of schizophreniform disorders. Nerve conduction studies showed demyelinating sensorimotor polyradiculoneuropathy. CSF analysis showed mild albumino-cytological dissociation. MRI brain and lumbosacral plexus showed thickened fifth cranial nerves and lumbosacral roots...

Though visuospatial skills are often considered a relative strength in autism spectrum disorder (ASD), unexplained difficulties relative to neurotypical (NT) peers have also been observed. Dissociations between spatial cognition and language skills in ASD may explain these difficulties given that these systems are linked in NT individuals. The current study examined performance on a mental rotation task that systematically varied stimulus features and the degree to which performance was associated with language in ASD relative to NT peers...

UNLABELLED: The best-known mode of action of calmodulin (CaM) is binding of Ca 2+ to its N- and C-domains, followed by binding to target proteins. An underappreciated facet of this process is that CaM is typically bound to proteins at basal levels of free Ca 2+ , including the small, intrinsically disordered, neuronal IQ-motif proteins called PEP-19 and neurogranin (Ng). PEP-19 and Ng would not be effective competitive inhibitors of high-affinity Ca 2+ -dependent CaM targets at equilibrium since they bind to CaM with relatively low affinity, but they could influence the time course of CaM signaling by affecting the rate of association of CaM with high-affinity Ca 2+ -dependent targets...

The intricate involvement of the serotonin 5-HT2A receptor (5-HT2A R) both in schizophrenia and in the activity of antipsychotic drugs is widely acknowledged. The currently marketed antipsychotic drugs, although effective in managing the symptoms of schizophrenia to a certain extent, are not without their repertoire of serious side effects. There is a need for better therapeutics to treat schizophrenia for which understanding the mechanism of action of the current antipsychotic drugs is imperative. With bioluminescence resonance energy transfer (BRET) assays, we trace the signaling signature of six antipsychotic drugs belonging to three generations at the 5-HT2A R for the entire spectrum of signaling pathways activated by serotonin (5-HT)...

Motives related to the enhancement of the positive effects of alcohol on social activity within sexes are strongly associated with alcohol use disorder and are a major contributor to adolescent alcohol use and heavy drinking. This is particularly concerning given that heightened vulnerability of the developing adolescent brain. Despite this linkage, it is unknown how adolescent non-intoxicated social behavior relates to alcohol's effects on social responding, and how the social brain network differs in response within individuals that are socially facilitated or inhibited by alcohol...

BACKGROUND: Ketamine is the prototypal rapid-acting antidepressant (RAAD) for TRD with approved indication for esketamine-nasal spray (ESK-NS). Distinctly, arketamine (R-KET) demonstrates enhanced antidepressant effects and neuroplasticity changes compared to esketamine, with fewer dissociative side effects and abuse potential. This study focuses on R-ketamine's therapeutic implications, safety, and tolerability in TRD treatment. METHODS: We report on a year-long follow-up of three TRD patients post-single IV R-KET administration...