Schizophrenia And Its Treatment : Welfare And Institutions Code Section 5008 ( L )

In the world today, there are many illnesses and disorders that affect people each and every day. One illness in particular that is very big in the US and all around the world is Schizophrenia. It is also the most researched topic. A person who is diagnosed with Schizophrenia lives a very different lifestyle than someone who is not. Many people would consider a person with schizophrenia to be “crazy.” Sadly enough, people with this illness do posses symptoms that might come off as crazy or insane. There are many different causes that come along with schizophrenia. A person who is diagnosed may not know it at first but they do later realize that they have some interesting thoughts, depending on the type of symptoms they posses while having this illness. Although the symptoms may be very brutal and causes cannot be controlled, there still is hope and treatments for individuals who have schizophrenia.

According to NAMI (), schizophrenia is a long term mental illness that interferes with a person’s ability to think clearly, make decisions, and relate to others, impairing a person from functioning to their full potential when left untreated. For these persons affected, it is many times difficult to distinguish what is real from what is not. “Unfortunately, no single simple course of treatment exists.” Research has linked schizophrenia to a multitude of possible causes” (NAMI).

Many psychotic patients, especially schizophrenics, display a lack of insight into their disorder (Keefe 9). Lack of insight refers to an unawareness of having a disorder, unawareness of having psychotic symptoms, and a refusal of treatment. Some scientists include other more specific aspects such as patients' views on cause of their disorder and/or symptoms,

(Salinger 173). Holden has molded his life around this fantasy and fails to realize that

They may need help completing simple task. Quotation negative symptoms are associated with then disruptions to normal emotions and behaviors. These symptoms are harder to recognize as part of the disorder and can be mistaken for depression or other current conditions. Quotation print the seas US Department of Health, 2010. Print the sea these symptoms include speaking seldomly, lack of motivation, lack of pleasure, and/or the blank expression app on their face, also known as quotation Flat effect. Quotation for cognitive skills can also be linked to schizophrenia. Soon as such as not being able to focus, poor comprehension, and memory problems. Negative symptoms can make it hard for those affected to live a normal

In the United States, many times mental illnesses are not taken seriously or taken in consideration at all. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines schizophrenia as “a mental disorder that is characterized by disturbances in thought (such as delusions), perception (such as hallucinations), and behavior (such as disorganized speech or catatonic behavior), by a loss of emotional responsiveness and extreme apathy, and by noticeable deterioration in the level of functioning in everyday life.” Schizophrenia affects a person’s ability to think, feel, and behave appropriately. Many people belittle mental illnesses, like schizophrenia, because they do not understand all the struggles these individuals go through, therefore, I believe this is a concept worth discussing about.

The human psyche is one of the most complicated things that exist, psychologists are still nowhere near understanding the complexity of the mind and the disorders that come with the uniqueness of the individual. Schizophrenia is one such disorder that begins to manifest in early adult hood. The disease is characterized by a disconnect from reality, which includes symptoms of hallucinatory affect. This leads to individuals being unable to adapt and cope with their environment which has socioeconomic effects on the individual such as homelessness. Suicide is also more prominent among the schizophrenic population with a rate of almost 5%. The mechanism behind it are just beginning to be unveiled through modern science which gives hope to individuals currently afflicted with this disorder.

There are the positive symptoms, negative symptoms, and cognitive issues. The positive symptoms include hallucinations and delusions. Positive does not mean “good” but it refers to having symptoms that should not be there (“Facts On Schiz”, NAMI.org). When a schizophrenic is experiencing hallucinations it is a very real experience for the person. The voices in the hallucination can be critical or be threatening which could lead to suicidal thoughts and weird behaviors. Because of the hallucinations and delusions “People also have a problem concentrating, confused thinking or sense that their thoughts are blocked” (“Schizophrenia”,

There are several people every year that are diagnosed with a mental disorder. In the world’s entire population, more than one percent of people have been diagnosed with schizophrenia (Brain and Behavior Research Foundation). When thinking of the billions of people in the world, it might not seem like that many people but once the number of those diagnosed is calculated it seems much larger. Currently there are more than seventy million people in the world that have been diagnosed with schizophrenia, only diagnosed. There are probably several more people who have this disorder and have not been diagnosed or are unable to obtain the resources to be diagnosed.

Positive symptoms are when symptoms of schizophrenia are bizarre additions to an individual’s behavior, such as delusions, disorganized thinking and speech, hallucinations, and inappropriate affect. Delusions, or incorrect thoughts, occur in various ways but the most popular is persecution, when the individual feels like everyone is out to get them, following delusions of grandeur, or feeling like they are of higher power such as being the Queen of England, when they clearly are not. Another symptom is disorganized thinking and speech that can include loose associations in which the conversation is all over the place, neologisms which is making up words, or the individual with schizophrenia will talk in clang or repeated rhymes. Third, is hallucinations

Approximately 22% of the American population suffers from some kind of mental disorder at any given time. (Passer and Smith, 2004) Schizophrenia is one of the most serious of these mental disorders, and there are many different kinds of treatment. While all mental disorders offer diagnosis and treatment challenges, few are more challenging than schizophrenia. It is both bizarre and puzzling, and has been described as “one of the most challenging disorders to treat effectively.” (Passer and Smith, 2004, 534)

Continuing, positive symptoms are characterized by many things. Firstly, thinking becomes broken and the mind is twisted and warped with false beliefs. People become delusional and paranoid that someone is following and threatening them. Secondly, emotions become mixed and jumbled up. Where most people would laugh, someone with schizophrenia might cry or get angry. The same thing may happen, vice versa. Thirdly, the most common, and most commonly known symptoms

Positive symptoms come and go. Sometimes these symptoms can be severe and other times they can be very mild. Positive symptoms include hallucinations, which are things that a person smells, hears, feels, or sees that are actually not there. Delusions, which are when the individual believes something that, are not associated with the individual’s culture; an example of this is if someone thinks messages are secretly being sent to

The Schizophrenia International Research Society is an academic organization with a global scope, devoted to the study of schizophrenia and related disorders. century, we focused more on individual therapy. The Schizophrenia International Research Society was founded in 2005 with the goal of bringing together scientists from around the world to exchange the latest advances in biological and psychosocial research in schizophrenia. The Society strives to facilitate international collaboration to discover the causes and better treatments for schizophrenia and related spectrum disorders. Part of the mission of the Society is to promote educational programs in order to effectively disseminate new research findings

After watching the video The Schizophrenics, there were several viewpoints and items mentioned that correspond to previous class discussions, as well as the information provided in the textbook. Schizophrenia is demarcated as a group of disorders, generally so disabling, that they are highly ranked in psychological breakdowns. The severity of the symptoms is so extreme that many schizophrenics were always hospitalized thus, encouraging continuous development in the etiology and treatment of this disorder.