Psychotic Depression Paper

Schizophrenia is a serious debilitating mental illness in which the victim is afflicted with bizarre delusions and prominent hallucinations. The delusions are profoundly invalid beliefs, and the hallucinations are equally invalid perceptions. There is also a disordering of the reasoning process, disordered emotional expression, and loss of motivation for work and social living. Typically, the illness starts in adolescence or early adulthood and, if untreated, usually worsens with age. (Lickey, Gordon, 1991)

Today, the hallmark symptom of schizophrenia is psychosis, meaning a patient experiences hallucination and delusions. The hallucinations usually manifest as the patient hearing voices inside their head. With delusions, patients think that a person in trying to read their mind, control their thoughts, or that someone is trying to hurt them (“Schizophrenia,” n.d.). With these types of symptoms, it makes it very difficult for a patients to manage their emotions, make decisions, think clearly, as well as live successfully independently (“Schizophrenia – Fact Sheet,” n.d.). For example, often times patients with schizophrenia do not make sense when they talk or just sit for a very long time without talking at all (“Schizophrenia,” n.d.). This

PSYCHOTIC DISORDERS Psychotic disorders are a collection of disorders in which psychosis predominates the symptom complex. Psychosis is defined as a gross impairment in reality testing. Specific psychotic symptoms include delusions, hallucinations, ideas of reference, and disorders of thought Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition (DSM-IV)

Schizophrenia is a severe, disabling and chronic disorder that affects people. Schizophrenia is diagnosed as a psychotic disorder. This is because a person suffering from schizophrenia cannot tell their own thoughts, perceptions, ideas, and imaginations from the reality. There is continuing debate and research as to whether schizophrenia is one condition or a combination of more than one syndrome that have related features. People suffering from schizophrenia may seem perfectly fine until the time they talk actually talk about they are thinking. People with schizophrenia rely on others for help since they cannot care for themselves of hold a job. There is no cure for schizophrenia, but there is treatment that relieves some of the symptoms. People having the disorder will cope with the symptoms all their lives. There have been cases of people suffering from schizophrenia leading meaningful and rewarding lives. There are five types of schizophrenia namely paranoid, disorganized, residual, undifferentiated, and catatonic schizophrenia. This paper will discuss paranoid schizophrenia.

Psychotic disorders can be described as a mental health disability in which a person experiences changes in thinking, perception, mood and behaviour which can severely disrupt their lives. Some of the main psychotic disorders include schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, psychotic depression, schizo affective disorder and drug induced pychosis. Some common symptoms when a psychotic disorder is developing include depression, anxiety, irritability, suspiciousness, blunted or flat or inappropriate emotion, changes in appetite, changes in thinking, difficulties in concentration or attention, a sense of alteration to ones self or the outside world, odd ideas and unusual perceptual experiences. Some behavioural symptoms can include sleep disturbance, social isolation or withdrawal and/or reduced ability to carry out work and social roles.

The DSM V defines schizophrenia as abnormalities in one or more of the following five domains: delusions, hallucinations, disorganized thinking (speech), grossly disorganized or abnormal motor behavior (including catatonia), and negative symptoms. The World Health Organization ranks schizophrenia as more disabling than amputation of both legs, severe stroke, end-stage kidney severe Parkinson’s disease, or terminal cancer. Symptoms of schizophrenia are delusions, hallucinations, distortion of oneself, unable to speak coherently, emotional distortions and lack of awareness of one’s illness. Persecutory delusions (i.e., belief that one is going to be harmed, harassed, and so forth by an individual, organization, or other group)

Schizophrenia is a psychiatric disorder that is characterized by a variety of symptoms and the disorganization of feeling and thought. It is an incurable disease whose causes are unknown, yet whose effects are mind and body crippling. (Young, 1988, p.13-14) This topic was chosen because it is interesting to study a disorder that worldwide, is viewed as a classic example of madness and insanity. Another reason of interest is because unlike many illnesses, schizophrenia doesn't have a noticeable pattern and its difficulty to be diagnosed as a disease makes the collection of statistics difficult. It is important to learn more about schizophrenia because a significant numbr of people are affected everyday

Imagine waking up being in an emotional and depressed state of mind, seeing things that are not there. What would someone do? All there is to do is live with it. This type of disorder is called schizophrenia. Schizophrenia affects a person’s ability to think, feel, and behave clearly. Although schizophrenia causes mass amounts of things like hallucinations, disorganized speech and behavior, and negative symptoms there are also some treatments for it,such as medication, interventions, therapy, and hospitalization.

Schizophrenia is a disorder of varying symptoms, in fact until the current edition of the DSM-V this disorder was broken into subtypes such as catatonic, disorganized, paranoid, undifferentiated, and residual. There many facets of schizophrenia such as auditory hallucinations, delusions, social isolation, as well as intense suspicion or agitation, each of which contributed to the previous subtypes of schizophrenia. Today, individuals with schizophrenia are assessed severity of symptoms rather than by classification.

Paranoid schizophrenia involves paranoid delusions and hallucinations with the exception of having disorganized symptoms (Castle & Buckley, 2008, p. 10). Individuals with paranoid schizophrenia may believe in certain ideas that actually are false. They may tend to hear sounds or senses that come to life only in their minds. They develop paranoia and start to believe somebody is trying to harm them in some type of way. Disorganized schizophrenia involves prominent disturbances in an individual’s thought stream (Castle and Buckley, 2008, p. 10). Individuals with disorganized schizophrenia display rigid patterns of behavior. They lose their train of thought, are emotionally indecisive and experience disorganized speech. Catatonic schizophrenia involves somebody having protruding motoric disturbances (Castle & Buckley, 2008, p. 10). This shows that individuals with catatonic schizophrenia have problem controlling their motor

I am Mr. Ratchawong. I am a Chartered Clinical Psychologist. My specialist field is psychotic disorders, an area within which I have worked over the past few years. Full details of my qualifications entitling me to give expert opinion and evidence are set out at the end of this report.

Schizophrenia is a very complex illness that changes peoples thinking perceptions, intellect. And altering their lives with problems of self-care. Those with schizophrenia are much more likely to smoke which can increase the chance of many health issues. It is estimated that twenty five percent of adults in America smoke an average of two packs a day as opposed to the seventy five to eighty percent of those diagnosed with schizophrenia. People with schizophrenia also are dying from heart disease more than any other medical condition. Wight gain is also a significant concern with some of the newer medications offered for schizophrenia. The World Health Organization that in next few decades’ depression will be the second leading cause of disability and death in the world. Depression can be very debilitative leading to the feeling of hopelessness and severe cases lead to suicide. Early detection and treatment is crucial. With anti-depressive medication and psychotherapy it is ninety percent curable. Bipolar offers all the same symptoms of depression but includes period of extreme exhilaration and

Psychosis is a state of severe mental impairment, which causes the person not to view the real or unreal correctly. (Lecture) People with psychosis often have problems with delusions and hallucinations.

Schizophrenia is classified as a psychotic disorder- the term psychotic simply means that a patient diagnosed with the disorder will exhibit a psychosis in which he or she seems detached from reality. The Fifth Edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5) released in May of 2013 has changed the way that schizophrenia will be diagnosed (Kupfer & Regier, n.d.). In the previous version, diagnosis required that symptoms be present for six months, and that there were at least one month of active symptoms. The symptoms that characterize schizophrenia are, “delusions, hallucinations, disorganized speech and behavior, and other symptoms that cause social or occupational dysfunction” (“Schizophrenia,” 2013).

Psychosis is a symptom included in many psychological diseases. In the premature stages of psychoses, it is problematic to diagnose the patient with a specific type of psychosis.