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THE GORDON WILSON LECTURE - NUTRITIONAL DISEASES OF THE NERVIOUS SYSTEM IN THE ALCOHOLIC PATIENT -  RAYMOND D. ADAMS, M.D.; BOSTON

Acute alcoholic auditory hallucinosis is an illness closely related though distinguishable from delirium tremens. It consists of pure auditory hallucinations without seizures, clouding of consciousness or confusion.

Usually the hallucinations take the form of accusative, threatening voices arising from some place in the immediate environment, viz., they are projected into space; and the patient reacts by intense fright or other emotion altogether appropriate to the situation.

The voices are so real he may commit suicide to avoid the consequences of these imagined accusations.

The syndrome usually clears within a few days, with normal mentation being restored, but 1 of every 12 to 15 of our patients have drifted into a chronic hallucinatory state which eventually become indistinguishable from paranoid schizophrenia, even though before the onset of this illness or in its early stages schizophrenic traits did not exist.

Twelve per cent of all chronic hospitalized alcoholic patients suffer from this disease. No systematic studies of the pathology have been made.