Delusional disorder: Retrospective analysis of 86 Chinese outpatients

Patients who visited the psychiatric outpatient service of Chang Gung Medic al Centre, Tao-Yuan, Taiwan during an 8-year period were studied retrospect ively. Among the 10418 outpatients, 86 (0.83%) were diagnosed as having DSM -IV delusional disorder (DD), including 61 (70.9%) with persecutory type, 1 2 (14.0%) with the mixed type, seven (8.1%) with jealous type, two (2.3%) w ith somatic type, two (2.1%) with unspecified type, one (1.2%) with erotoma nic type, and another one with grandiose type. The ratio of women to men wa s 0.86. The mean age at onset was 42.4 +/- 15.41 years, with women being ol der than men. Thirty-seven cases (43.0%) presented with depressive symptoms at their first visit. Subjects were divided into four groups: persecutory type, jealous type, mixed type and others. There were no significant differ ences between the four groups in terms of gender, age at onset, time-lapse before seeking psychiatric help, the presence of hallucination or the prese nce of depression.