The following symptoms and complaints may indicate Tourette syndrome:
Leading symptom
- Tics – motor combined with vocal.
- motor tics:
- Uvoluntary, sometimes violent, movements not related to a specific purpose.
- Suddenly shoot in
- They are always the same movements, which can occur individually, serially (several times a day) or only in stressful situations
- vocal (phonetic) tics:
- Involuntary utterances, noises, sounds.
- motor tics:
According to the complexity, a distinction is made between simple and complex tics.
In simple motor tics, only a few muscle groups are affected by the movement disorders. Most often they are found on the head and face. Examples:
- Eye blinking, rolling, blinking.
- Eyebrows raise
- Puff up cheeks
- Make faces
- Jaw movements
- Head shaking
- Lip movements
- Nasal murmur
- Shoulder shrug
- Frown
- Teeth chattering
Complex motor tics involve numerous muscle groups. Examples:
- Tugging at the clothes
- Stomping
- Bouncing, jumping
- Turn in a circle, bounce
- Clapping
- Imitating the actions of others (echopraxy).
- Writesics
- Inappropriate obscene gestures such as showing the middle finger or masturbatory movements (copropraxia)
Simple vocal tics include:
- Calling out syllables (hm, eh, ah, ha).
- Meaningless sounds
- Noisy inhaling/exhaling
- Cough
- Pull up nose
- Whistle
- Squeaking, squealing, grunting
- Clearing throat
- Sniffing
- Spitting
- Buzzing
Complex vocal tics include:
- Calling out fragments of speech
- Imitating animal sounds, repeating words (echolalia).
- Ejecting obscene and aggressive expressions (coprolalia) (19-32%); common in severe courses with multiple comorbidities (concomitant diseases).
- Speech blocks
- Repeating your own spoken phrases and words (palilalia).
Secondary symptoms
- Prolonged reaction time
- Impairment of fine motor skills
