Dissociation, including multiple personality disorder, has long been a controversial topic. Patients with suggestive symptoms are often misdiagnosed as malingering or even having
schizophrenia. The former as a result of the overlooking of a clinician on the fact that suggestibility itself plays a key role in the emergence and perpetuation of this illness and the latter due to the lack of knowledge of the whole dissociative disorder spectrum, often resembling that of a psychotic disorder. Another contributing factor to the small number of patients with this diagnosis is due to the reluctance of a psychiatrist to do so because of his/her lack of experience and also fear of humiliation of being accused of seeking fame from diagnosing this somewhat glamorous phenomenon. In Malaysia, various culture bound syndromes often present with similar symptoms too. This article will attempt to understand this dissociation on the local context using case studies as a reference point.
Dissociative identity disorder (DID) previously known as multiple personality disorder is associated with depression and traumatic childhood which can be either physically or sexually abuse. It is hard to establish diagnosis of DID because of the complexity and controversies that surrounding it. We report a case of a young man who has DID and Major Depressive Disorder in the background of traumatic childhood experience who was recently admitted to our inpatient psychiatric unit and demonstrated transitions to other distinct personality state.