Cotard and Capgras delusions in a patient with bipolar disorder: “I’ll prove, I’m dead!”

Cotard and Capgras delusions in a patient with bipolar disorder: “I’ll prove, I’m dead!” Mehmet Hamdi Örüm ORCID Icon & Aysun Kalenderoğlu. Psychiatry and Clinical Psychopharmacology, http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/24750573.2017.1371661

Abstract: Cotard is a syndrome that is characterized by ideas of damnation or rejection, anxious melancholia, insensitivity to pain, and nihilistic delusions concerning one’s own body or existence. It is most often encountered in middle age or older women who are severely depressed. Capgras syndrome is a rare psychiatric disorder with colourful symptoms. The patient believes that the identities of close relatives or friends are not real but are replaced by others. Co-existences of psychiatric and organic diseases with Cotard’s syndrome and Capgras syndrome are reported in different studies. There is still requirement of more research to establish a position in diagnostic classification systems for these syndromes which are thought to have a multifactorial etiology. In this report, we described a patient with bipolar disorder type-2 who displayed comorbid Cotard and Capgras delusions which were most evident at the onset of menstrual periods.

KEYWORDS: Cotard syndrome, Capgras syndrome, bipolar disorder type-2, menstrual cycle