52 Years- Old Woman’s Rare Brain Disorder Turns Human Faces Into Dragon-Like Figures

A 52-year-old woman in The Hague, Netherlands, has a rare neurological disorder in which she sees warped faces of individuals. The woman, as seen in a report in The Lancet, experiences a lifelong history of perceiving faces of people changing into dragon faces and hallucinating the same faces dozens of times a day.

Why does her face look like a dragon?

“Her ability was to see and recognize real faces, but for some minutes they would become black, elongated, have long pointed ears and a projecting snout, and feature reptiloid skin and enormous yellow, green, blue, or red eyes,” according to the published case report. “She experienced identical dragon-like faces floating toward her numerous times a day from the walls, electrical outlets, or the computer screen, in both with and without face-like patterns, and at night viewed numerous dragon-like faces in the darkness,” the report continued.

The ordeal for the woman, in accordance with the report, started only during her early adolescence when the facial change became increasingly frequent and pronounced. “She felt ostracized, became depressed, and abused alcohol for several years,” the report stated further.

What was the woman’s diagnosis?

Doctors diagnosed the woman with prosopometamorphopsia, or PMO—also called the demon face syndrome. It is a rare neurological disorder in which an individual perceives other faces as twisted, while other objects look normal, according to experts. The distortions involve alterations in form, size, texture, color, or location and may pertain to a whole face or parts of a face.

This condition, according to specialists, is usually associated with brain lesions. However, it can be caused by problems resulting from head trauma, epilepsy, or migraine and in some cases arises with no detectable changes in the brain.

This condition is rare, in that over the past 100 years, there have been fewer than 100 cases reported worldwide. In most individuals, the bizarre visions only persist for a few days or weeks, but in some cases can last for years. Doctors report that experiencing visual distortions can be extremely distressing and impact the mental wellbeing of those struggling with the condition, as you can experience anxiety, begin to withdraw from social functions, and become depressed.

Why does prosopometamorphopsia happen?

Though scientists haven’t yet worked out exactly why prosopometamorphopsia happens, they believe that it might be related to:

Brain injury

There are a number of networks within the brain that result in being able to identify and process faces, and if these become injured and can’t communicate effectively with each other, then it might cause faces to appear odd or distorted.

Stroke

Experts say that either strokes or seizures impact the brain in the long term, damaging or disrupting the networks responsible for processing faces.

Tumors

Brain tumors are also associated with prosopometamorphopsia, resulting in facial distortions, which are said by doctors to vanish after tumors are surgically removed.

Migraines

Although it is a less frequent cause, most individuals diagnosed with this disorder have experienced symptoms of ‘demon face syndrome’ during a migraine.

Drug abuse

Those who regularly use hallucinogenic drugs are more likely to have conditions that have hallucinations as a symptom.