Specific features in the mental status of patients with primary hyperprolactinemia

Abstract

Primary hyperprolactinemia (PHP) is one of the principal causes of female sterility. Fifty-three women with pathologic hyperprolactinemia of various origins were examined. A high incidence of combination of PHP with mental disorders - up to 70% - was revealed. Despite comparative polymorphism and the nonspecific type of psychopathologic disturbances proper in different variants of primary hyperprolactinemia, women with the primary hyperprolactinemia syndrome develop similar personality characteristics, e.g. constellations of such features as conservatism, altruism, self-sufficiency, autism. The said constellation appears to reflect the pathological shifts in the brain systems of patients with PHP, which are related to the development of the adaptive forms of maternal behavior in the period of breastfeeding.