Commentary on visual hallucinations and Charles Bonnet syndrome.

The authors comment on two case reports of visual hallucinations due to non-psychiatric disorders: retinal detachment in a patient with schizophrenia, and Charles Bonnet syndrome. The physiology of visual misperception is reviewed, based on abnormalities along various points from the eye to the optic tracts to the occipital cortex. The approach to patients with visual hallucinations should include not only an evaluation for psychiatric disorders, but also an appreciation of possible non-psychiatric causes that may have major ramifications for care and potentially for preservation of sight.

Late-life depression: a neuropsychiatric approach.

Late-life depression refers to depressive syndromes defined in the American Psychiatric Association's Diagnostic and Statistical Manual and in the International Classification of Diseases that arise in adults older than 65 years of age. Late life depressive syndromes often arise in the context of medical and neurologic disorders. There is a high prevalence of depression in various neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer's disease, Lewy body disease, Parkinson's disease, cerebrovascular disease and frontotemporal dementias.