Cotard's syndrome--two case reports.

Two cases of Cotard's Syndrome are described--one in a 33-year-old housewife suffering from paranoid schizophrenia and another in a 43-year-old housewife with acute psychotic depression. This rare syndrome is characterized by an extreme form of nihilistic delusion in which the patient, more frequently a woman, denies her own existence and that of the external world. Its onset is often sudden with no previous psychiatric history. Treatment of the condition depends on the underlying psychiatric illness. Both cases responded well to treatment.