[Huntington chorea. A clinically relevant differential diagnosis in geriatric psychiatry patients?].

We report on seven geropsychiatric patients, aged 62 to 86, who had received either in- or outpatient psychiatric treatment for different disorders before being diagnosed with Huntington's disease (HD) by molecular biological methods. At the time of diagnosis, these patients presented only with mild involuntary movements in addition to other, nonspecific psychiatric symptoms such as depressive, paranoid, or dementia symptoms. In six of the seven cases, the HD symptoms had previously been misdiagnosed as tardive dyskinesia because these patients had been treated with neuroleptics in the past. Family histories were nonspecific. Three of the seven patients had family members who were described as "mentally ill" and already deceased. Huntington's disease (HD) should be considered as a differential diagnosis in geropsychiatric patients presenting nonspecific psychiatric symptoms.