ADULT-ONSET SELF STIMULATING BEHAVIOR
TPD 25. Yıllık Toplantısı ve Klinik Eğitim Sempozyumu, İzmir, Turkey, 19 - 22 May 2022, vol.33, pp.109, (Summary Text)
- Publication Type: Conference Paper / Summary Text
- Volume: 33
- City: İzmir
- Country: Turkey
- Page Numbers: pp.109
- Ankara University Affiliated: Yes
Abstract
ADULT-ONSET SELF STIMULATING BEHAVIOR Hilal Erdoğan, Zehra Uçar Hasanlı, Koray Hamza Cihan, Burçin Çolak, Rifat Serav İlhan Department of Psychiatry, Ankara University, Ankara, Turkey OBJECTIVE: Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by deficits in cognitive skills, social and communicative behaviors. Self - stimulation behaviors seen in autistic individuals are considered as one of the defining characteristics. Self - stimulatory behavior consists of repetitive, stereotyped behavior that has no apparent functional effects on the environment, examples of which are rocking, hand waving and head weaving, mouthing or rubbing parts of one's body, mouthing or spinning objects. Below, we will share a case with self - stimulation behaviors that can be called atypical. There is no directly similar case in the literature. Verbal consent was obtained from our patient for the case report. CASE: A 33-year-old female patient admitted to Ankara University School of Medicine Psychiatry Department presenting with breaking things in the house, self-mutilation and inappropriate speech. She also had a depressive episode due to unemployment about 10 years ago. At that time, she started to push at the windows of her own room and broke the windows. She started dealing with the boiler at home 8 years ago and was pushing and pulling the pipes, she broke the boiler once. About 7 years ago, after she had had a toothache, because of the urge to break her teeth, she started to apply constant pressure to her teeth and was biting hard objects, thus damaging all her teeth. A few years later, after the uncontrolled sexual intercourse, she began asking her father if he slept with her mother and had an urge to have sex particularly with her father. These behaviors have increased in the last 2 years; her family couldn't leave the patient alone at home for the last 1 year. Depressed mood, a dull facial expression, and having constant eye contact were remarkable in the examination. No psychotic symptoms were detected. The patient who had social communication problems in her history, got a high score on the Autism Spectrum Quotient. Clozapine was started for behavior control. DISCUSSION: As it was understood from this patient's history and examination, it was thought that she might have autism spectrum disorder due to her inability to act in accordance with the social context, difficulties in establishing social relationships. Also, self-stimulatory behaviors are one type of such atypical behavioral cues used for the diagnosis. They refer to stereo-typed, repetitive movements of body parts or objects, such as arm flapping, head banging, and spinning. In this case, it was thought that the bending, pushing and pulling behaviors that would cause the patient to harm herself were the symptoms belonging to self-stimulatory behaviors. Keywords: Autism Spectrum Disorder, Autism Spectrum Quotient, Self-Stimulatory Behavior