Contaminação mental no transtorno obsessivo-compulsivo: revisão da literatura e orientações para a pesquisa e a clínica durante a pandemia da COVID-19

Is it possible to become contaminated through thought? Not objectively, but subjectively yes. The construct referred to as “mental contamination” is still poorly investigated and rarely mentioned in Portuguese-language scientific literature. Therefore, the aim of this article was to review studies that correlated mental contamination to obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) over the past 5 years. The search was performed on the PubMed, MEDLINE and PsycINFO databases; after applying the inclusion criteria, six studies were fully reviewed. Based on the analysis of samples, instruments adopted, results found and limitations reported by the authors of each study, we conclude that: 1) few studies have examined both clinical and non-clinical samples; 2) the Vancouver Obsessional Compulsive Inventory-Mental Contamination was the instrument most commonly used to measure mental contamination; 3) mental contamination is related to other phenomena that are also present in OCD (e.g.,disgust propensity); and 4) the studies commonly have sample limitati ons. Towards the end of the text, we present the necessary steps to encourage Brazilian scienti fi cresearch on mental contaminati on and also suggest how mental health professionals can guide pati ents with OCD during the pandemic, to reduce suscepti bility to mental contaminati on.