Blepharospasm and obsessive-compulsive disorder

Although essential blepharospasm is considered to be a form of focal dystonia, many patients with blepharospasm have been noted to have concomitant depression, anxiety, phobias, hypochondriasis, and other emotional and behavioral disorders, suggesting a psychiatric component to the disease that is phenomenologically similar to obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) in terms of the repetitive, perseverative, and persistent nature of the symptoms. The Maudsley OCD questionnaire was administered to 21 patients with blepharospasm and 19 normal controls. The blepharospasm patients scored significantly higher than the controls (p less than .01). Although preliminary, the current study does support at least a phenomenological link between OCD and blepharospasm.