Delusion Parasitosis: Successful Non-pharmacological Treatment of a Folie-à-deux

Delusional parasitosis, originally described by Ekbom in 1938, is an illness in which the individual believes small animals such as insects, lice, vermin, or maggots are living in or thriving on his/her skin. The delusion is not secondary to another psychiatric ill ness, and in general the personality remains otherwise preserved. Munro (1980) classifies delusional parasi tosis as a subtype of monosymptomatic hypochon driacal psychosis, and has shown that a substantial proportion of patients with MHP respond to pimozide. Prior to the introduction of that drug, the prognosis of the condition was held to be very poor.