In the 1990’s, the National Institute of Mental Health were looking at childhood with OCD (obsessive compulsive disorder, which usually has a gradual onset), and noticed that there was a group of children who had a sudden, abrupt onset of OCD symptoms. These children had a dramatic, “overnight” onset of obsessive thoughts, compulsive behaviours and motor or vocal tics. There were also other neuropsychiatric symptoms including anxiety, regression, hyperactivity and poor attention and concentration. They then found that it coincided with a  group A streptococcal infection. They called the condition Pediatric Autoimmune Neuropsychiatric Disorder Associated with Streptococcus (PANDAS). 

Later it was discovered that the disorder could also be triggered by other viral or bacterial infections.

It was furthered observed that the disorder had the same acute, dramatic onset by environmental triggers and metabolic disorders. This was called Pediatric Acute-onset Neuropsychiatric Syndrome (PANS).

The disorder and syndrome is classified as:

-Abrupt, dramatic onset of obsessive compulsive disorder or severely restricted food intake, with or without vocal or motor tics

-Additional Neuropsychiatric symptoms including anxiety, separation anxiety, emotional lability and/or depression, irritability, aggression, severely oppositional behaviours, behavioural/developmental regression, deterioration in school performance, sensory or motor abnormalities and somatic symptoms such as sleep disturbances or enuresis

PANS and PANDAS stems from a place of immune dysregulation and severe neuro-inflammation.

Christine Vasilevski (Naturopath at Wings for Wellness Naturopathy) has both personal and professional experience in PANS/PANDAS which is why it is an area she has chosen to specialise in.