17 - Kurt Schneider Criteria for Schizophrenia

*Kurt Schneider (1887-1967). Schneider contributed a description of first-rank symptoms, which, he stressed, were not specific for schizophrenia and were not to be rigidly applied but were useful for making diagnoses.

*He emphasized that in patients who showed no first-rank symptoms, the disorder could be diagnosed exclusively on the basis of second-rank symptoms and an otherwise typical clinical appearance.

*Clinicians frequently ignore his warnings and sometimes see the absence of first-rank symptoms during a single interview as evidence that a person does not have schizophrenia.

1. First-rank symptoms
   1. Audible thoughts
   2. Voices arguing or discussing or both
   3. Voices commenting
   4. Somatic passivity experiences
   5. Thought withdrawal and other experiences of influenced thought
   6. Thought broadcasting
   7. Delusional perceptions
   8. All other experiences involving volition made affects, and made impulses
   
   
2. Second-rank symptoms
   1. Other disorders of perception
   2. Sudden delusional ideas
   3. Perplexity
   4. Depressive and euphoric mood changes
   5. Feelings of emotional impoverishment
   
   
   *A memory device that is frequently used to remember the first rank symptoms is ABCD: Auditory hallucinations, Broadcasting of thought, Controlled thought (delusions of control),Delusional perception.