[Approaches to cognitive-behavioral features in the treatment of obsessive-compulsive disorder].

The author has extensive clinical experience in the treatment of refractory obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). There appear to be numerous clinical factors affecting the treatment responses of OCD patients, but the cognitive-behavior features of these patients could also be contributory. In this article, the author reports a man with OCD who had cognitive-behavioral features affecting the severity of OCD. There was no definitive diagnosis of developmental disorder. However, approaches to cognitive-behavioral features were effective. It became much easier for the patient to suppress his compulsions. The author speculates that approaches to cognitive-behavioral features are both important and useful for the treatment of patients with OCD regardless of whether or not developmental disorders are present.

Impact of obsessive-compulsive symptoms in Tourette's syndrome on neuropsychological performance.

AIM: Although inconsistencies in neuropsychological impairments in Tourette's syndrome (TS) have been discussed with respect to comorbid disorders, such as obsessive-compulsive disorder, few studies have focused on the specific dimensions of obsessive-compulsive symptoms (OCS) related to TS, such as aggression and symmetry. The aim of this study was to explore the impact of specific TS-related OCS on neuropsychological performance. METHODS: A series of neuropsychological tasks examining attention and executive functioning were performed in groups of 33 TS participants and 18 healthy controls. The neuropsychological performance of TS with Aggression OCS (n = 11) were compared to TS without Aggression OCS (n = 22) and controls by using MANCOVA controlling for age. In the same way as Aggression, we compared the performance of three groups by Symmetry: TS with Symmetry OCS (n = 14), TS without Symmetry OCS (n = 19) and controls. RESULTS: TS participants with Aggression OCS tended to make more perseverative errors than those without. Global OCS severity and tic severity did not correlate with any neuropsychological performances. No significant differences were detected between TS participants with and without Symmetry OCS. CONCLUSION: Neuropsychological deficits in TS might be affected not by global OCS severity but by specific TS-related OCS.

Obsessive-compulsive symptom dimensions in Japanese tourette syndrome subjects.

OBJECTIVES: To investigate the current and lifetime frequency and severity of obsessive-compulsive (OC) symptom dimensions in Tourette syndrome (TS) patients, and how these dimensions affect clinical characteristics. METHODS: Forty TS outpatients (29 males, 11 females) were interviewed with the Dimensional Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale (DY-BOCS), the Yale Global Tic Severity Scale (YGTSS), the Shapiro Tourette Syndrome Severity Scale, and the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF). RESULTS: OC symptoms were present in 80% of the total sample. The miscellaneous and the symmetry dimensions were the most frequent at the "current" and "lifetime" surveys, respectively. The aggression dimension had the smallest difference between "worst ever" and current ratings among the all OC symptom dimensions. TS patients with the aggression dimension (n=7) had significantly lower scores in the GAF scale and higher frequencies of coprolalia. There were significant correlations between the YGTSS severity scores and specific DY-BOCS dimensions. CONCLUSION: OC symptoms are frequent in TS subjects and there were differences in the frequency, severity, and course of the OC symptom dimensions. These results emphasize the need for future longitudinal studies using a dimensional approach for the evaluation of OC symptoms in tic disorders.

The impact of tics, obsessive-compulsive symptoms, and impulsivity on global functioning in Tourette syndrome.

This study investigated the relationships between tics, obsessive-compulsive symptoms (OCS), and impulsivity, and their effects on global functioning in Japanese patients with Tourette syndrome (TS), using the dimensional approach for OCS. Fifty-three TS patients were assessed using the Yale Global Tic Severity Scale, the Dimensional Yale-Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Scale, the Impulsivity Rating Scale, and the Global Assessment of Functioning Scale. Although tic severity scores were significantly and positively correlated with OCS severity scores, impulsivity severity scores were not significantly correlated with either. The global functioning score was significantly and negatively correlated with tic and OCS severity scores. Of the 6 dimensional OCS scores, only aggression scores had a significant negative correlation with global functioning scores. A stepwise multiple regression analysis showed that only OCS severity scores were significantly associated with global functioning scores. Despite a moderate correlation between tic severity and OCS severity, the impact of OCS on global functioning was greater than that of tics. Of the OCS dimensions, only aggression had a significant impact on global functioning. Our findings suggest that it is important to examine OCS using a dimensional approach when analyzing global functioning in TS patients.

Remembering and forgetting: directed forgetting effect in obsessive-compulsive disorder.

It has been reported that episodic memory seems to be impaired in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) because the patients repeat a specific checking behavior, but it is still unknown if OCD patients show memory impairments associated with their unique symptoms or not. To study episodic memory in OCD patients, we examined the directed forgetting effect. Patients with OCD and healthy control participants were given a list of 24 emotionally neutral everyday words (12 remember [R]-cued words and 12 forget [F]-cued words) under two conditions: List and Item. The results of our study showed that OCD patients recalled a number of F-cued words similar to that for controls and relatively fewer R-cued words than controls under both List and Item conditions. Consequently, the directed forgetting effect was smaller in OCD patients than controls. Our results demonstrated that both selective encoding and retrieval inhibition processes are impaired in OCD, and we suggest that recall of unfavorable items to be forgotten intruded into necessary items to be remembered. This impairment in episodic memory may partially account for some of the unique clinical symptoms of OCD.