Hoarding Disorder Differential Diagnoses

Updated: Aug 25, 2021
  • Author: Vlasios Brakoulias, MBBS, PhD, M(Psych), FRANZCP; Chief Editor: David Bienenfeld, MD  more...
  • Print
DDx

Diagnostic Considerations

Hoarding can occur as part of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) where individuals have obsessions in relation to certain items and compulsions to collect these objects. Pathological hoarding should also be distinguished from the collecting of objects in a systematic and organized way that doesn’t impair function (e.g., porcelain dolls, teddy bears). In addition to a high co-occurrence of depressive and anxiety disorders, hoarding disorder is also associated with a high rate of co-occurring attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). [11]

Excessive accumulation of objects can also occur as part of organic states such as dementia, cerebrovascular accidents, or alcohol-related brain disorders. In these circumstances, the hoarding is relatively new in onset and much more disorganized with more prominent squalor. [16]

Differential Diagnoses