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Comment| Volume 20, ISSUE 10, P1117-1126, October 1985

Gilles de la Tourette syndrome and the neurological basis of obsessions and compulsions

  • Jeffrey L. Cummings
    Correspondence
    Address reprint requests to Dr. Jeffrey L. Cummings, Neurobehavior Unit, West Los Angeles VAMC, Brentwood Division, Wilshire & Sawtelle Boulevards, Los Angeles, CA 90073.
    Affiliations
    From the Neurobehavior Unit, West Los Angeles VAMC (Brentwood Division), and the Neurobehavior Program, Department of Neurology, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, CA, USA
    Search for articles by this author
  • Michael Frankel
    Affiliations
    From the Neurobehavior Unit, West Los Angeles VAMC (Brentwood Division), and the Neurobehavior Program, Department of Neurology, UCLA School of Medicine, Los Angeles, CA, USA
    Search for articles by this author
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/0006-3223(85)90011-3
Gilles de la Tourette syndrome and the neurological basis of obsessions and compulsions
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      Abstract

      Gilles de la Tourette syndrome (GTS) is a chronic neurological disorder manifested by involuntary motor tics and vocalizations. Many GTS patients also suffer from obsessions and compulsions. The clinical similarities between GTS and obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), their occurrence among members of the same families, and the fact that both can be observed as symptoms of known basal ganglia disturbances suggest that GTS and OCD share common neurological mechanisms. It is hypothesized that the tics and vocalizations of GTS are aberrant manifestations of simple motor programs that are spontaneously generated by the basal ganglia and that obsessions and compulsions represent more complex motor plans initiated by similar anomalous activities.
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      Article info

      Publication history

      Received in revised form: March 26, 1985
      Received: January 22, 1985

      Footnotes

      ☆Supported in part by the Gatepost Foundation, the Tourette Syndrome Association, and the Veterans Administration.

      Identification

      DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/0006-3223(85)90011-3

      Copyright

      © 1985 Published by Elsevier Inc.

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