Clinical practice of rTMS reveals a functional dissociation between agency and hallucinations in schizophrenia.

Renaud Jardri (1) , Yvonne Delevoye-Turrell , Bernard Lucas , Delphine Pins (1) , Virginie Bulot , Christine Delmaire (2) , Pierre Thomas (1) , Pierre Delion , Jean-Louis Goeb

1 LNFP - Laboratoire de Neurosciences Fonctionnelles et Pathologies
2 Neuro-anatomie fonctionnelle du comportement et de ses troubles

We report here the case of a hospitalized 11 year-old boy (YP) with a positive diagnosis of 'Childhood Onset Schizophrenia'. YP experienced verbal-auditory hallucinations, a delusion of alien control and hetero-aggressive behaviour. Antipsychotic drugs were unsuccessful and furthermore provoked severe acute dystonia. fMRI-guided rTMS applied over several cortical regions provided the means to reveal for the first time a functional dissociation between auditory-verbal hallucinations and agency. These results demonstrate the efficacy of rTMS for young patients suffering from drug-resistant hallucinations but they furthermore question the physiopathology of the hallucinatory process by suggesting that agency and hallucinations may be sub-served by different neural networks.

Domaines: Neurosciences [q-bio.NC]

Renaud Jardri, Yvonne Delevoye-Turrell, Bernard Lucas, Delphine Pins, Virginie Bulot, et al.. Clinical practice of rTMS reveals a functional dissociation between agency and hallucinations in schizophrenia.. Neuropsychologia, 2008, 47 (1), pp.132-138. ⟨10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2008.08.006⟩. ⟨hal-00331402⟩