[Principle factors and symptom complexes in delirium tremens, factor and a group analytic study].

Abstract

Before treatment 80 unselected patients suffering from delirium tremens were examined with regard to 13 psychopathological criteria. For the data a matrix of correlation was computed and it was factor analyzed according to the principal-component method. In consideration of the course of the value-curve two factors were interpreted. The result, however, is an undetailed classification. In addition to that, the data were cluster-analyzed according Ward. The results of the multivariate statistical analysis admit the assumption of two great, though heterogenous groups of symptoms (hallucination/vigilance). Factor I comprises the symptoms, disorder of orientation and consciousness, sweating, agitation and tremor on its positive pole, the duration of the delirant state on its negative pole. Factor II combines paranoid-hallucinatory symptoms, fearful affects and suggestibility on its positive pole, while on its negative, there are happy affect and grand-mal seizures. The bipolarity of this factor and additional diagnoses show that paranoid-hallucinatory symptoms without disorder of consciousness and grand-mal seizures mutually exclude each other. From this a differential therapy treating patients suffering from paranoid-hallucinatory symptoms with neuroleptics (e.g. Haloperidol) can be deduced, while the danger of grand-mal seizures has to be considered when disorders of consciousness appear.