Au cœur de l'incertitude diagnostique en âge de transition
(2023) Revue Médicale de Bruxelles — Vol. 44, n° 6, p. 596-599 (2023)
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- (en) [In the depths of diagnostic uncertainty in transitional youth] Transitional age, between the ages of 16 and 24, corresponds to the period of the emergence of first symptoms of psychiatric disorders. If some studies recommend a fast and accurate diagnosis to reach a standardised therapeutic, recent results suggest that those first symptoms cannot be categorised as one psychiatric disease at this young age. Those symptoms are rather part of “at-risk” subtypes or at stages of the pathology that do not yet allow clinical differentiation. This approach allows earlier treatment at the still undifferentiated stages of a psychiatric illness, but also more specific. We present the case of a 21-year-old female young adult, consulting for emotional lability, suicidal and at-risk sexual behaviours and drug consumption. She describes relational difficulties, a fear of abandonment and a past marked by traumatic elements. The first hypothesis was a borderline personality disorder. A few weeks after the start of the treatment with SSRI, the patient has multiple manic symptoms, which will only stabilize after discontinuation of antidepressant medication, emergency hospitalization, and initiation of mood-stabilizing medication. Notions of psychiatric staging allowed an explanation to the patient of her clinical situation without closing the diagnostic question and the beginning of appropriate management before the episode. © 2023 Association des Medecins anciens etudiats de l'Universite libre de Bruxelles (A.M.U.B.). All rights reserved.
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Hennebicq, T., & Nicolis, H. (2023). Au cœur de l’incertitude diagnostique en âge de transition. Revue Médicale de Bruxelles, 44(6), 596-599. https://doi.org/10.30637/2023.22-087 (Original work published 2023)