Patients with longstanding catatonia or a diagnosis of schizophrenia may be less likely to respond. Most patients with the syndrome respond rapidly to low-dose benzodiazepines, but electroconvulsive therapy is occasionally required. In many cases, the catatonia must be treated before any underlying conditions can be accurately diagnosed. Once thought to be a subtype of schizophrenia, catatonia is now recognized to occur with a broad spectrum of medical and psychiatric illnesses, particularly affective disorders. Excited catatonia is a less common presentation in which patients develop prolonged periods of psychomotor agitation. Catatonia of the retarded type is characterized by immobility, mutism, staring, rigidity, and a host of other clinical signs. Two subtypes of the syndrome have been identified.
Catatonia is a psychomotor syndrome that has been reported to occur in more than 10% of patients with acute psychiatric illnesses.