Am J Psychiatry 1993; 150:1411-1414
Copyright © 1993 by American Psychiatric Association
Smooth pursuit eye movements and saccadic eye movements in patients with delusional disorder
O Gambini, C Colombo, R Cavallaro and S Scarone
Department of Biomedical and Technological Sciences, University of Milan Medical School, Italy.
OBJECTIVE: This study used eye movement tests to examine whether frontal
lobe dysfunction is present in delusional disorder. METHOD: Smooth pursuit
and voluntary saccadic eye movements of 15 delusional patients, 40
schizophrenic patients, and 40 normal subjects were recorded and analyzed
statistically. RESULTS: The schizophrenic patients differed significantly
from the normal subjects in some smooth pursuit eye movement
characteristics, whereas both the schizophrenic and the delusional patients
showed more saccades than the normal subjects during the smooth pursuit
test. The delusional patients and normal subjects differed significantly in
some voluntary saccadic eye movement characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: The data
support the idea of a biological dysfunction in eye tracking in delusional
disorder.
