Reflections on asperger syndrome and comorbidity with psychotic disorders

Abstract

A reflection on Asperger syndrome (AS) and schizophrenia (S) comorbidity could be of great interest to psychiatrists for adult patients. There is little awareness of Asperger syndrome in adult clinical practice due to the early age of onset of the disease. When AS is present, it often persists for many years without being diagnosed. Patients come into contact with psychiatric services because they present a variety of psychopathological symptoms, and they are described as being odd, with bizarre behavior in addition to the rest of the symptomatology. We briefly report a case to illustrate this point.

The circumstances on which clinicians should focus in order to distinguish between the two diagnoses and improve diagnostic reliability and the possibility of correct diagnosis are explained.