Hoarding and Shopping: What is Compulsive and What is Not - Two Case Reports

Abstract

Compulsive hoarding has been generally described as the compulsive acquisition of possessions and the inability to discard them. It has been considered as a syndrome consisting of compulsive acquisition, difficulty discarding and clutter. It is described mainly in association with obsessive-compulsive disorders (OCDs) and in geriatric populations, although it may be seen in a range of other disorders.Compulsive buying or shopping disorder has been characterized by excessive or poorly controlled preoccupations, urges, or behaviours regarding shopping and spending that lead to subjective distress or impaired functioning. Although it has been considered as part of impulse control disorders, it has also been reported associated with other disorders.These two entities have raised relevant questions regarding whether they are part of dimensional or categorical constructs, symptoms or well established disorders. By presenting two case reports, the authors address some of these issues and the existing scientific literature.