Gilles de la Tourette's Disease—A Review

The author describes Gilles de la Tourette's disease, noting that it is characterized by sudden involuntary movements, explosive involuntarty utterances, and imitative phenomena; the pathognomonic feature is the sudden, uncontrolled repetitive utterance of obscenities. The general progression of symptoms is cephalocaudad, with frequent waxing and waning; symptoms become worse during affective arousal and improve with relaxation. Etiology is unclear, with recent evidence suggesting catecholaminergic overactivity. Although this disease and schizophrenia are clearly two separate entities, the author suggests that Gilles de la Tourette's disease may be behaviorally related to schizophrenia and biochemically related to the amphetamine psychosis. The treatment of choice is haloperidol.