Tag: functional neurological disorder
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Leading FND Site Confirms Criticisms on Prevalence Outlined in Our Letter to Neurology Journal
In two recent posts, here and here, I wrote about our letter on inflated prevalence claims for functional neurological disorder (FND) and about the response from the authors of the study we criticized. The 2021 article in NeuroImage: Clinical, “Neuroimaging in functional neurological disorder: state of the field and research agenda,” asserted that FND was the…
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Update on Our Letter Concerning the Prevalence of Functional Neurological Disorder
In August, I submitted a letter to NeuroImage: Clinical concerning inflated rates of prevalence of functional neurological disorder, on behalf of myself and nine colleagues. After the letter went through peer review and a round of revisions, I was informed in early November that it had been accepted, as I noted in a blog post.…
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Letter on Inflated FND Prevalence Rates Accepted for Publication
As I have regularly noted, patients with diagnoses of functional neurological disorder (FND) experience tremendous suffering. A patient who goes by the moniker @FnDPortal has written a compelling and sometimes harrowing essay, Cadenza for Fractured Consciousness: A Personal History of the World’s Most Misunderstood Illness, that is well worth a read in order to understand some…
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Letter to Journal about Inflated Claims of FND Prevalence
I have spent some time trying to correct the record on the reported prevalence of functional neurological disorder (FND). As I have documented, leaders of the FND field have spent the last decade misrepresenting the findings of a seminal 2010 study, Stone et al, to claim that this diagnosis is the second-most-common presentation at outpatient…
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A Letter Requesting Corrections of Inflated Prevalence Rates in Nine More FND Papers
Several colleagues and I recently wrote to the journal NeuroImage: Clinical to request a correction in a 2021 article about functional neurological disorder (FND). The article included the false claim that a seminal 2010 study found that FND was the second-most-common diagnosis at outpatient neurology clinics. In fact, FND—called conversion disorder at the time—was the…
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FND Experts Agree To Correct Inflated Prevalence Claim
For years, experts in functional neurological disorder (FND) have cited a seminal study in their field to claim that the diagnosis was the second-most-common presentation at outpatient neurology clinics, with a prevalence of 16%. This claim was, and is, categorically untrue. The Scottish Neurological Symptoms Study (SNSS), which yielded multiple papers about a dozen years…
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A Letter Regarding Inflated Prevalence Rates for Functional Neurological Disorder
I have posted previously about how papers on functional neurological disorder (FND) have routinely mis-cited a seminal 2010 study in asserting that the diagnosis is the second-most-common presentation at neurology clinics, with a rate of 16%. In fact, the 2010 study found that only 5.5% had FND, the new name for the antiquated Freudian construct…
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Questions About the Prevalence of Functional Neurological Disorder and the Research on Hoover’s Sign for Functional Leg Weakness
(This is a long-ish post. Sorry! It covers two complicated issues. I want to thank an intrepid source for help with this.) I have great sympathy for patients diagnosed with functional neurological disorder (FND). Their symptoms can be seriously disabling and their plight has long been neglected and dismissed by the medical establishment. When I…
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Can Functional Neurological Disorder Be an Indication of Prion Disease?
A recent article in the Journal of Neurology presents a twist on the issue of functional neurological disorder (FND). The article, which was published in September, is called “Functional neurological symptoms as initial presentation of Creutzfeldt‐Jakob disease: case series.” Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease is a prion disorder that leads to dementia and death, usually within months. But…
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A Letter About the Inflated Prevalence Rate of Functional Neurological Disorder
I have recently written two posts (here and here) about how experts in functional neurological disorder (FND) have a tendency to assert prevalence rates that ignore their own diagnostic criteria. Today I sent a letter to the corresponding author of yet another paper that has similarly engaged in this problematic strategy. I have posted the…
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An FND Patient’s View–and More on Those Inflated Prevalence Rates
In a post last week, I noted that experts in FND have a tendency to assert prevalence rates that ignore their own diagnostic criteria. Before offering further thoughts on that score, I want to make one point very explicit: I am in no way questioning whether people with the diagnosis have serious disorders and very…
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Does Functional Neurology Disorder Account for a Third of Outpatient Neurology Consults?
Functional neurological disorder, or FND, is the new-ish name for the hoary Freudian construct known as conversion disorder. For decades, psychiatrists informed patients that they were “converting” their emotional distress and anxieties into physical symptoms like tremors, seizures, sensory and cognitive deficits, a halting gait, or other physical dysfunctions. The impossibility of proving such claims…