THE PSYCHIATRIC FEATURES OF SO-CALLED LETHARGIC ENCEPHALITIS

Abstract

Probably no single topic in the field of nervous and mental diseases has, within the past year, received more attention than so-called lethargic encephalitis, and yet the vast literature on the subject contains little concerning the psychiatric aspect of this disorder besides that given in a few papers noted later under a discsussion of the literature. We came in direct or indirect contact with about fifty or more cases of this disorder during the winter and spring of 1920. With the exception of the four cases reported in this paper, especial attention was not given to the mental picture except in regard to the condition called "substupor" that was so pronounced in most of the cases. The physicians who had charge of most of the patients were more particularly interested in cranial nerve palsies, lost knee jerks, spasmodic muscular twitchings, bladder disturbances, nystagmus and a host of other neuropathologic findings.