Transcript Schizophrenia - cdorerickson

Schizophrenia
• A thought Disorder
Schizophrenia
• It is a disease that affects 1% of the
world’s population
• It has more impact on urban people than
rural people
• It is a disease that affects men and women
equally
• It is a disease of the brain
Schizophrenia is not caused by:
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Inadequate parenting
Overzealous mothers
Poor family relations
It is not split personality
Schizophrenia and Genetics
• 70% of persons who develop
schizophrenia have a genetic basis for it.
Usually, there is a relative who has the
disease.
• The closer in relation to the ill person, the
more likely one is to get the disease.
Schizophrenia and Genetics
• If you have an identical twin who has
schizophrenia, you have a 50% chance of
developing schizophrenia.
Schizophrenia: Three Types
• Paranoid type
• Catatonic type
• Disorganized type
Paranoid Schizophrenia: the
affected person may:
• Talk to himself
• Gesture to himself
• Become preoccupied with idea that he/she is
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being followed or watched
Hear voices (possibly from “the devil” or “God”)
Develop elaborate delusions and believe
outrageous things (such as aliens from another
planet have invaded his/her body).
Paranoid Schizophrenia: the
affected person may:
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See things like dark figures, bugs or spots
Feel people are out to get them
Believe in all sorts of conspiracies
Have ideas that no amount of evidence to
the contrary can dislodge
Catatonic Schizophrenia: the
affected person may:
• Seem almost frozen and unable to move
at times
• Stop talking or greatly reduce conversation
• Appear lazy, unmotivated and uninterested
“out of it”
• Become completely detached from reality
and have no sense of anything going on
around them.
Disorganized Schizophrenia: the
affected person may:
• Talk in jumbled sentences
• Be essentially incoherent in their speech
• Suffer from an inability to keep track of
his/her thought processes and will jump
from subject to subject
• Become detached from what is happening
around them
Schizophrenia is often described in terms of
positive (not meaning good) and negative
(not meaning bad) symptoms
• Positive symptoms include delusions and
hallucinations
• Negative symptoms are the loss or absence of
normal traits or abilities, and include flat affect
and emotion, and lack of motivation.
• A third symptom grouping, the disorganization
syndrome, includes chaotic speech, thought,
and behavior.
Schizophrenia treatment
• Biological
• Psychological
• Social
Schizophrenia Treatment:
Biological
• Medications
– called antipsychotic
– (not “antischizophrenic”)
– they deal with some of the symptoms
• delusions, hallucinations, disorganized behavior
• These drugs work by blocking dopamine receptors
in the brain.
Schizophrenia Treatment:
Psychological
• Patients will need therapy
– supportive
– “digging deep” can help some, but that is the
exception, not the rule
Schizophrenia Treatment:
Psychological
• Those who have family benefit most from
families who:
– are informed about the illness
– have support
– Have skills to deal with the ill family member
Schizophrenia Treatment:
Psychological
• Family member skills:
– low key
– low demand
– use simple sentences
– able to ignore the inconsequential features of the
illness
– are able to respond to dangerous behavior
– can accept that their ill family member may never
be like he once was
Schizophrenia Treatment: Social
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Rehabilitation
Social skills training
Vocational assistance
Environmental modification
– reduce stimuli