Psychological correlates of the course of Sydenham's chorea

Published reports provide contradictory evidence concerning the cause, nature, and course of Sydenham's chorea: Physiological, psychological, and interactional hypotheses have been advanced. Reports supporting any of these views suffer from lack of detail, objective observations, and/or longitudinal behavioral sampling. This case was studied longitudinally with numerous psychological tests. They revealed acute encephalopathy and severe personality disturbance in the acute stage, followed by rapid and lasting clearing of both symptoms. Thus, this case provided evidence consistent with virtually all published reports and with each hypothesis about Sydenham's chorea, suggesting the need for more careful longitudinal studies and a conceptual framework which can more fully embrace all the data.This study was begun while the author was at the William S. Hall Psychiatric Institute in Columbia, South Carolina.The author gratefully acknowledges the comments of Professor Arthur L. Benton.