Tourette syndrome

Tourette syndrome — also called Tourette's syndrome, Tourette Spectrum (TS), Tourette's disorder, or Gilles de la Tourette syndrome is a neurological or neurochemical disorder characterized by tics: involuntary, rapid, sudden movements or vocalizations that occur repeatedly in the same way. Symptoms include multiple motor and one or more vocal tics present at some time during the disorder although not necessarily simultaneously; the occurrence of tics many times a day (usually in bouts) nearly every day or intermittently throughout a span of more than one year; the periodic change in the number, frequency, type and location of the tics, and in the waxing and waning of their severity; symptoms disappearing for weeks or months at a time; and onset before the age of 18. Vocal tics may fall into various categories, including echolalia (the urge to repeat words spoken by someone else after being heard by the person with the disorder), palilalia (the urge to repeat one's own previously spoken words), lexilalia (the urge to repeat words after reading them) and, most controversially, coprolalia (the spontaneous utterance of socially objectionable words, such as obscenities and racial or ethnic slurs). There are many other vocal tics besides those categorized by word repetition - in fact, a TS tic can be almost any possible short vocal sound, with the most common tics resembling throat clearing, short coughs, grunts, or moans. Motor tics can be of endless variety and may include hand-clapping, banging the knuckles together, and contorted facial grimacing.

Famous People with Tourette's

• Joshua James William Skaug - author
• Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf - former NBA player
• Howard Ahmanson, Jr, American Christian fundamentalist and millionaire philanthropist
• Tim Howard - goalkeeper for Manchester United Football Club
• Jim Eisenreich - former major league baseball player
• Mike Johnston - relief pitcher for the Pittsburgh Pirates
• Michael Wolff - Jazz musician
• Dr. Samuel Johnson, lexicographer, certainly had Tourette syndrome as evidenced by the writings of James Boswell.
• Some historians think Mozart may have had Tourette syndrome, although many experts on Tourette syndrome disagree (see external link below).
• Some neurologists think Thelonius Monk may have had Tourette syndrome