Mind & EmotionGreek → English
Anosognosia
/əˌnɑsɑɡˈnoʊʒə/noun
A patient's inability to recognise that they have a neurological or psychiatric impairment.
The Greek roots
ἀ-
a-
not, without
νόσος
nósos
disease
γνῶσις
gnôsis
knowledge
Literally: “no knowledge of the illness”
The story of the word
Joseph Babinski named it in 1914 for patients paralysed down one side who calmly insisted that the arm was fine and simply chose not to move. This is not denial in the everyday sense: the machinery that monitors the body has been damaged along with the body, so there is nothing left to register the loss. It can lift as suddenly as it appeared, and cold water in the ear canal has been shown to interrupt it briefly.
- How it travelled
- Ancient Greek → French scientific coinage → English
- First recorded
- 1914
Same family
agnosianosologyzoonosisdiagnosis
In a sentence
Anosognosia is why some stroke patients refuse rehabilitation.
Treating psychosis is harder when anosognosia removes the reason to take the medication.