[Psychiatrist's language].

BACKGROUND

Clear and unambiguous description of psychiatric symptoms is a prerequisite for a personalized and reliable mental state examination.

AIM: To draw attention to the correct use of psychiatric language.

METHOD: Description of persistent linguistic errors and relevant but too little used terms, and a new Dutch translation for some psychopathological terms.

RESULTS

The following linguistic errors are presented: ‘concentration’ as if it means the sustaining of attention; ‘compulsive behaviour’ that is not really compulsive; ‘no diagnosis’ while no disorder is diagnosed; ‘no psychopathology’ as if the patient has no science of psychopathology; ‘to impress as’ for characteristic that are not impressive; ‘mild’ while psychiatric disorders are never mild; ‘inhibition’ as if we can observe that subjective phenomenon; ‘signs’ for symptoms that do not appear to us at all; ‘weather and climate’ for affect and mood, while the mood generally changes somewhat faster than he climate. Attention is drawn for the terms chronognosia, overvalued idea, sensory hyporeactivity and disorders of self-awareness. New Dutch translations for dysmorphic disorder, délire de négation, and paranoic are explained.

CONCLUSION

Psychiatrists, watch your language!