[Remission of schizophreniform psychosis after brain tumor surgery]

A 19-year-old female was admitted to hospital due to a schizophrenia-like psychosis of the paranoid type including delusions and various hallucinations. Neurologically she only showed tics of the eyebrows with increased eye blinking. 30 months before an astrocytoma located on the left basal temporal lobe had been resected after the patient suffered from several psychomotor and two grand mal seizures. Following post-operative anticonvulsant therapy seizures had completely disappeared and the patient had been free of symptoms of any kind. After the acute onset of the psychosis another follow-up MRI of the brain using coronary sections revealed a small relapse-tumor. Symptoms disappeared after high-dose neuroleptic therapy. Finally another surgical intervention led to a lasting remission of the psychotic symptomatology (so far 18 months). Postoperatively neuroleptics could be discontinued. Clinical picture and MRI findings will be discussed with a focus on possible etiological factors in schizophrenia.