Schizophrenia Personal Statement

Schizophrenia is affecting people more now than a few decades ago. This illness is across the US and is present in every culture. People are now aware and understand how the illness can be devastating to one’s life. Schizophrenia is a mental disorder of the brain but it is highly treatable. In the US the total amount of people affected with the illness is about 2.2 % of the adult population. The average number of people affected per 1000 total population is 7.2 % per 1000, which means a city that is consists of 3 million people will have approxiamately 21,000 people suffering from schizophrenia. People with mental illness should seek early treatment to be stabilized with medications. During a 10 year period 25% of schizophrenics

My passion and determination to undertake study within the mental health sector dwells from the insight I have been privileged to gain in my current role as a link care coordinator, working with people who suffer from a range of ailments within the mental health spectrum; from learning disabilities, Alzheimer’s, Dementia, OCD, Autism to name but a few.

Insanity, then, is inordinate or irregular, or impaired action of the mind, of the instincts, sentiments, intellectual, or perceptive powers, depending upon and produced by an organic change in the brain.

In this week’s readings chapter twelve is about schizophrenia. Schizophrenia is a psychotic disorder in which personal, social, and occupational functioning deteriorate as a result of strange perceptions, unusual emotions, and motor abnormalities. This disorder is very interesting, but also kind of scary to me. They literally end up in their own world, losing contact with reality. With that, they also experience hallucinations or delusions, which can cause them to do abnormal, possibly dangerous actions. These symptoms must last six months or more before the person can be diagnosed with schizophrenia. It will affect 1 out of 100 people in the world during ones lifetime. This disorder, unlike many others, is just as common among men and women,

In the early 1900’s, Eugen Bleuler coined the term “schizophrenia.” Schizophrenia is from the Greek roots “schizo” meaning split and “phrene” meaning mind. This specific mental illness is commonly characterized by hallucinations, delusions, and very unresponsive emotional behavior. Delusions are most commonly those of grandeur, persecution, and reference. Delusions of grandeur are characterized by the belief that you have special powers you do not possess. The belief everyone is after you is what makes up delusions of persecution. Lastly, the belief that everyone is talking about you and everything pertains to you is what delusions of reference are characterized by. In addition, the patient often suffers from

Schizophrenia which affects approximately 1 percent of the population, usually begins before age 25 and persists throughout life. The illness is a life long debilitating condition for about 40% of patients and is enormously costly in both social and economic terms. Despite the presence of delusions, hallucinations and cognitive impairment which characterize the illness, overall life expectancy is not altered (although there is a significantly increased risk-of suicide in the early years).

Exploring Schizophrenia A disease that leads to more suicide deaths than AIDS, SIDS, and MS combined is present in one in one hundred people globally. Schizophrenia is prone to lead to long-term disability, unemployment, drug and alcohol abuse, and family trauma. Ten percent of all patients commit suicide.

Children with a first episode of psychosis, typically before 18 years of age, are diagnosed with early-onset schizophrenia (EOS). Compared to adult-onset schizophrenia (AOS) the disorder is associated with increased severity of symptoms, specifically of the negative subtype, and poorer outcome. Due to the extreme rarity of EOS, the current research is still in its initial stages and is often times based on findings in research that focuses on AOS. However, researchers have revealed valuable information that serve as a foundation for a more complete understanding of EOS that will aid in providing increased efficacy in treatment approaches. Future research should attempt to maintain consistency with other experiments’ inclusivity of

Schizophrenia is a brain disease; Schizophrenia’s main problem is with insanity. What is Insanity? Webster’s dictionary states it as “A deranged state of the mind occurring as a specific disorder (as Schizophrenia) (Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary 646).” The definition of insanity is closely related to schizophrenia described as a disorder. When having schizophrenia one's behavior and thinking change dramatically. One’s behavior might contain several signs as loss of personal contact, social withdrawal, diminution of appetite, depletion of hygiene, delusions and hallucinations are just to name a few. Individuals with schizophrenia many times have no outward appearance of looking ill. In another case, a paranoid schizophrenic would

     Schizophrenia is an extremely puzzling condition, the most chronic and disabling of the major mental illnesses. Approximately one percent of the population develops schizophrenia during their lives. With the sudden onset of severe psychotic symptoms, the individual is said to be experiencing acute schizophrenia. Psychotic means out of touch with reality, or unable to separate real from unreal experiences.

I’ve been diagnosed with Schizophrenia, it is crazy, I know. Some would believe that being schizophrenic does make me crazy and sometimes I think I am. All the thoughts floating around, voices speaking to me, seeing things that aren’t really there, I couldn’t set priorities and not feeling “the right way” about many things. Before I was formally diagnosed, my family was very upset with me, my actions, and did not understand what was going on with me. I was having a very hard time caring for my premature baby properly and not bonding well with her, I think because I was having trouble with my emotions. Every day was hard, nothing seemed to make sense. I was sick and we all did not realize how bad it really could become, until it did. The good new is

I have always been interested in my pattern of thinking. Often I have always thought that people don’t use their imagination as much as I do. I have always been into the darker side of life, watching horror movies and listening to heavy metal etc. Obviously this is all fantasy though; demons aren’t really going to rip me to pieces like in the movies. Some people can’t differentiate reality from fantasy though. I know in my head that I am able to think like most psychopaths but I am able to tell the difference between right and wrong. What I mean by that is I understand where they’re coming from and how they see the world because at times I feel that way. I want to why I am able to control my thoughts (as sick as they may be) and actions

Schizophrenia has been associated with the dysregulation of many neurotransmitter systems. Large amounts dopamine is the oldest and most widely accepted theory of the pathophysiology of schizophrenia and stems from identification of dopamine D2 receptor blockade as the mechanism of action of antipsychotics. Dopamine D2 binding sites are increased in a person with schizophrenia, which contributes to cognitive impairment. The modern day understanding is suggested that a hyperactive mesolimbic and a hypoactive mesocortical dopamine system underlie the 'positive ' and 'negative ' symptoms that are seen in schizophrenia. Serotonin, glutamate, GABA and acetylcholine dysregulation have also been implicated in the pathogenesis of schizophrenia, in addition to dopamine. Glutamatergic signaling is attenuated in schizophrenia and is distinguished by a loss of NMDA receptor-mediated excitatory neurotransmission. GABA levels are also attenuated due to down regulation of GABA transporter (GAT) gene expression. “There is a concordant up regulation of GABAA receptors, which may contribute to the alterations in neural synchrony and consequently working memory impairment” (tocris.com, 2015).

It is a frightening disorder that strikes about one percent of the world population. It surfaces most frequently during puberty and has the potential to forever destroy the lives of the people who are unfortunate enough to be its victim. The disorder is schizophrenia and it manifests itself by disturbing normal psychiatric behavior. The symptoms of schizophrenia are characterized by both positive and negative symptoms. Positive symptoms include hallucinations, delusions, and other unusual or disorganized behavior. Unresponsiveness, lack of activity, and loss of interest characterize negative symptoms. Though it is possible for doctors to diagnose and treat patients with schizophrenia, the causes of schizophrenia are

Throughout psychology today there are six different theoretical models that seek to explain and treat abnormal functioning or behavior. These different models have been a result of different ideas and beliefs over the course of history. As psychology began to grow so did the improvements in research techniques. As a result psychologists are able to explain a variety of disorders in terms of the six different theoretical models. In the movie A Beautiful Mind it follows the mathematician John Nash as he struggles with schizophrenia. It an attempt to explain John Nash’s disorder the six different theoretical models will be looked at, they include biological model, psychodynamic model, behavioral model, cognitive model, humanistic model,