Improvement in Symptom Severity, Cognitive Assessment, and Choice Reaction Time in a Patient with Schizophrenia, Paranoia, and Aggression

Background: 37-year-old, Venezuelan male, with a prior established diagnosis of schizophrenia presented with emotional disturbances including depression, expressive agnosia, paresthesias, hyper-emotionality, fear/paranoia, aggressive thoughts, and brain fog. His Graded Symptom Checklist (GSC) severity was 44/162. His Trails A and B times were 22.7 seconds and 48.8 seconds respectively. His Choice Reaction Time (cRT) latency was 445 milliseconds.

Methods: A five-day, multimodal program of receptor based neurological rehabilitation was administered three times per day, one hour per session. Each session consisted of non-invasive trigeminal nerve stimulation, vision therapy exercises, vestibular rehabilitation exercises, neuromuscular rehabilitation exercises, therapeutic activity exercises, and off-vertical axis rotations.

Results: At the end of five days of treatment there were resolutions in GSC (-95.5%), TA (-25.1%), TB (-31.6%), and cRT (-14.2%) latency. The patient stated that he felt no aggression, depression, paranoia, or brain fog.

Conclusion: Short duration, multimodal, intensive programs of receptor-based neurological rehabilitation may be a viable method to improve neurological integrity and emotional stability in individuals with psychiatric disease. The authors suggest further investigation into short duration, multi-modal, intensive approaches to restoring neurological function in individuals suffering from emotional, psychological/psychiatric disease.

Acknowledgements: The authors would like to thank Dr. Kelsey Brenner for her assistance with the treatment of the patient in this case.

Keywords: Schizophrenia, paranoia, Aggression, social agnosia, Vestibular Rehabilitation, Off-vertical axis rotation

Conference: International Symposium on Clinical Neuroscience: Clinical Neuroscience for Optimization of Human Function, Orlando, United States, 7 Oct - 9 Oct, 2016.

Presentation Type: Poster Presentation

Topic: Abstracts ISCN 2016

Citation:

Antonucci MM, Link PE and Carrick FR (2016). Improvement in symptom severity, cognitive assessment, and choice reaction time in a patient with schizophrenia, paranoia, and aggression. Front. Neurol. Conference Abstract: International Symposium on Clinical Neuroscience: Clinical Neuroscience for Optimization of Human Function. doi: 10.3389/conf.fneur.2016.59.00057
Received: 02 Sep 2016; Published Online: 07 Sep 2016.

Footnotes:

1 Carrick Institute, Clinical Neuroscience, United States

2 Plasticity Brain Centers, Neurorehabiltiation, United States

3 NeuroSynergy Associates, PA, Neurorehabilitation, United States

4 Harvard Medical School and Harvard-Macy MGH Institute of Health Professions, USA, Medical Education, United States

Correspondence: Dr. Matthew M Antonucci, Carrick Institute, Clinical Neuroscience, Orlando, United States, drnucci@gmail.com