This study aims to assess the correlation between NAA (N-acetyl-l-aspartate), CHO (choline), and CRE (creatine) levels in the hippocampus regions of individuals suffering from obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and defensive styles of the ego.

The study group was composed of twenty patients with OCD and twenty healthy controls. NAA, CHO, and CRE values in the hippocampal region using proton magnetic resonance spectroscopy (1H-MRS) were measured. Participants’ defense styles were ascertained by administering the Defense Style Questionnaire-40.

The patient group’s NAA levels were considerably lower than the control group’s on both sides of the hippocampus. The levels of CHO and CRE did not significantly differ between the two groups. The following statistically significant correlations were discovered: in the comparison group, there were negative correlations between the scores of mature defense styles and the right and left CHO levels, as well as between the immature defense mechanism scores and the right NAA levels in both the patient and control groups. In the patient group, there were also negative correlations between the left NAA values and the scores of mature defense styles.

OCD patients have lower levels of NAA in the hippocampus. To validate and extend the current findings, more research involving a greater sample size is required.

Cognitive models of mental contamination (i.e. feelings of internal dirtiness without contact with a contaminant) propose that these feelings arise when individuals misappraise a violation. However, an operational definition of ‘violation’ and identification of specific violation misappraisals is limited.

This study’s aim was to elaborate on cognitive models using qualitative data from those with lived experience to fill these gaps.

Twenty participants with a diagnosis of obsessive-compulsive disorder and/or a trauma history took part in a semi-structured interview about violation. Grounded theory was used to analyse interview transcripts.

Three categories emerged, each with several themes – qualities of violation, violation-related appraisals, and violation-related behaviours. Different violation-related appraisals were associated with different emotions and urges. Specific self-focused appraisal sub-themes (i.e. permanence of consequences; self-worth; responsibility, self-blame and regret) were most closely related to emotions tied to mental contamination. These findings support and expand upon existing cognitive models of mental contamination, identifying key violation-related appraisals and differentiating between mental contamination-related appraisals and those related to other emotional sequelae. Future quantitative and experimental research can evaluate the potential of these appraisals as intervention targets.

1. (1) Delivering CBT to adolescents with OCD as a blended treatment combining individual and group-based treatment with flexible parental involvement is a promising option which merits further evaluation.

2. (2) OCD symptoms and general psychiatric symptoms were reduced during and after treatment.

3. (3) Use of a blended treatment based on a CBT model is feasible.

Problems with cognitive flexibility have been associated with multiple psychiatric disorders, but there has been little understanding of how cognitive flexibility compares across these disorders. This study examined problems of cognitive flexibility in young adults across a range of psychiatric disorders using a validated computerized trans-diagnostic flexibility paradigm. We hypothesized that obsessive-compulsive spectrum disorders (eg, obsessive-compulsive disorder, trichotillomania, and skin-picking disorder) would be associated with pronounced flexibility problems as they are most often associated with irrational or purposeless repetitive behaviors.

A total of 576 nontreatment seeking participants (aged 18-29 years) were enrolled from general community settings, provided demographic information, and underwent structured clinical assessments. Each participant undertook the intra-extra-dimensional task, a validated computerized test measuring set-shifting ability. The specific measures of interest were total errors on the task and performance on the extra-dimensional (ED) shift, which reflects the ability to inhibit and shift attention away from one stimulus dimension to another.

Participants with depression and PTSD had elevated total errors on the task with moderate effect sizes; and those with the following had deficits of small effect size: generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), antisocial personality disorder, and binge-eating disorder. For ED errors, participants with PTSD, GAD, and binge-eating disorder exhibited deficits with medium effect sizes; those with the following had small effect size deficits: depression, social anxiety disorder, OCD, substance dependence, antisocial personality disorder, and gambling disorder.

These data indicate cognitive flexibility deficits occur across a range of mental disorders. Future work should explore whether these deficits can be ameliorated with novel treatment interventions.

1. (1) To explore the literature considering explanations of the co-occurrence of OCD and PTSD symptomology.

2. (2) To consider how symptoms of two mental health conditions can maintain one another and attenuate the effectiveness of evidence-based treatment for the other mental health condition.

3. (3) Consider the use of concurrent therapeutic approaches to treat co-occurring mental health conditions.

Both maternal and, separately, paternal mental illness are associated with diminished academic attainment among children. However, the differential impacts of diagnostic type and degree of parental burden (e.g. one v. both parents affected) on these functional outcomes are unknown.

Using the Swedish national patient (NPR) and multi-generation (MGR) registers, 2 226 451 children (1 290 157 parental pairs), born 1 January 1973–31 December 1997, were followed through 31 December 2013. Diagnostic status of all cohort members was defined for eleven psychiatric disorders, and families classed by exposure: (1) parents affected with any disorder, (2) parents affected with a disorder group (e.g. neuropsychiatric disorders), and (3) parents affected with a specific disorder (e.g. ADHD). Pairs were further defined as ‘unaffected,’ ‘single-affected,’, or ‘dual-affected.’ Among offspring, the study evaluated fulfillment of four academic milestones, from compulsory (primary) school through University (college). Sensitivity analyses considered the impact of child's own mental health, as well as parental education, on main effects.

Marked reductions in the odds of achievement were observed, emerging at the earliest levels of schooling for both single-affected [adjusted odds ratio (aOR), 0.50; 95% CI 0.49–0.51] and dual-affected (aOR 0.29, 95% CI 0.28–0.30) pairs and persisting thereafter [aOR range (single), 0.52–0.65; aOR range (dual), 0.30–0.40]. This pattern was repeated for analyses within diagnosis/diagnostic group. Main results were robust to adjustment for offspring mental health and parent education level.

Parental mental illness is associated with profound reductions in educational attainment in the subsequent generation, with children from dual-affected families at uniquely high risk.

Patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) present difficulties in the cognitive regulation of emotions, possibly because of inefficient recruitment of distributed patterns of frontal cortex regions. The aim of the present study is to characterize the brain networks, and their dysfunctions, related to emotion regulation alterations observed during cognitive reappraisal in OCD.

Adult patients with OCD (n = 31) and healthy controls (HC; n = 30) were compared during performance of a functional magnetic resonance imaging cognitive reappraisal protocol. We used a free independent component analysis approach to analyze network-level alterations during emotional experience and regulation. Correlations with behavioral scores were also explored.

Analyses were focused on six networks encompassing the frontal cortex. OCD patients showed decreased activation of the frontotemporal network in comparison with HC (F(1,58) = 7.81, p = 0.007) during cognitive reappraisal. A similar trend was observed in the left frontoparietal network.

The present study demonstrates that patients with OCD show decreased activation of specific networks implicating the frontal cortex during cognitive reappraisal. These outcomes should help to better characterize the psychological processes modulating fear, anxiety, and other core symptoms of patients with OCD, as well as the associated neurobiological alterations, from a system-level perspective.

Approximately 40% of patients treated for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) do not respond to standard and second-line augmentation treatments leading to the exploration of alternate biological treatments. Continuous theta burst stimulation (cTBS) is a form of repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation inducing more rapid and longer-lasting effects on synaptic plasticity than the latter. To the best of our knowledge, only one recent study and a case report investigated the effect of cTBS at the supplementary motor area (SMA) in OCD.

This study aimed to examine the effect of accelerated robotized neuronavigated cTBS over SMA in patients with OCD.

A total of 32 patients with OCD were enrolled and randomized into active and sham cTBS groups. For active cTBS stimulation, an accelerated protocol was used. Bursts of three stimuli at 50 Hz, at 80% of MT, repeated at 5 Hz were used. Daily 2 sessions of 900 pulses each, for a total of 30 sessions over 3 wk (weekly 10 sessions), were given. Yale–Brown Obsessive-Compulsive Rating Scale (YBOCS), Clinical Global Impressions scale (CGI), Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAM-D), and Hamilton Anxiety Rating Scale (HAM-A) were administered at baseline and at end of weeks 3 and 8.

A total of 26 patients completed the study. Active cTBS group showed significant group × time effect in YBOCS obsession (P < .001, η2 = 0.288), compulsion (P = .004, η2 = 0.207), YBOCS total (P < .001, η2 = 0.288), CGI-S (P = .010, η2 = 0.248), CGI-C (P = .010, η2 = 0.248), HAM-D (P = .014, η2 = 0.224) than sham cTBS group.

Findings from our study suggest that adjunctive accelerated cTBS significantly improves psychopathology, severity of illness, and depression among patients with OCD. Future studies with larger sample sizes will add to our knowledge.

Numerous clinical and epidemiological studies show an increased prevalence of anxiety disorders, including obsessive-compulsive disorder, in subjects followed for bipolar disorder. This comorbidity is not without consequence on the evolutionary course of the mood disorder, with frequent relapse, a lower pharmacological sensitivity and an increased risk of suicide.

We aim to analyze through a clinical observation and according to the data of the literature the place of ECT in the management of a bipolar disorder with comorbid OCD.

In this work, we reported a case of a patient in which depressive episodes of bipolar disorder and OCD comorbidity were present and the symptoms were resolved using ECT.

Mrs. TN with family history of suicide had experienced her first depressive episode in 2005 in post-partum, when she had 31 years old. The diagnosis of bipolar disorder II with comorbid OCD was retained after she has had several depressive relapses with few hypomanic ones and reported obsessive suicidal ideation with many religious compulsions. Despite several pharmacotherapeutic combinations (Teralithe, Olanzapine and Venlafaxine) a remission of the symptoms could only be obtained after 15 sessions of ECT that she has had in 2017.

ECT can be a very good substitute for the treatment of mood disorders with comorbid OCD resistant to pharmacotherapy.

No significant relationships.