LESSON PROPER

Schizophrenia

 a long-term mental disorder of a type involving a breakdown in the relation between thought,
emotion, and behavior, leading to faulty perception, inappropriate actions and feelings, withdrawal
from reality and personal relationships into fantasy and delusion, and a sense of mental
fragmentation.
 (in general use) a mentality or approach characterized by inconsistent or contradictory elements.
 Schizophrenia affects the way you think and cope with daily life. Someone living with schizophrenia
may be experiencing hallucinations, delusions, disorganised thinking and lack motivation for daily
activities.

 Is a group of disorders characterized by loos of contact with reality, marked disturbances of thought
and perception, and bizarre behaviour.

CATEGORIES OF SCHIZOPHRENIC HALLUCINATION

1. Tactile ( touch ) – people with Schizophrenia often have the sensation that there are things (like
bugs or insects) crawling across their skin.
2. Visual (sight) – this kind of hallucination causes the person to see things that are not really there.
3. Auditory (hearing) – this is the most common type of hallucination. People with auditory
hallucinations hear voices and sounds that others cannot hear.
4. Olfactory ( smell) – the person experiencing an olfactory hallucination smells thing ( usually-foul-
smelling things) that others do not smell.
5. Command ( hearing) – when a voice commands the person to do something he/she would not
ordinarily do.

CHARACTERISTICS OF SCHIZOPHRENIA

1. Disturbance of Though and Attention – people suffering schizophrenia often cannot think
logically and as the result of this they cannot write a story, because every word they write down
might make sense.It is multiple delusions.
a. Persecutory Delusion – the schizophrenic believes that he/she is being talked about,
spied upon, or his/her death being planned.
b. Delusion of Reference – the schizophrenic gives personal importance to completely
unrelated incidents, objects, or people.
2. Disturbances of Perception – during acute schizophrenic episodes, people say that the world
appears different to them, their bodies appear longer colors seem more intense and they cannot
recognize themselves in a mirror.
3. Disturbances of Affect – schizophrenic persons fail to show” normal” emotions.
4. Withdrawal from Reality – during schizophrenic episodes, the individual becomes absorbed in his
inner thoughts and fantasies.
 5. Delusions and Hallucinations – delusions are inflexible misleading beliefs. They appear as a
result of exaggerations or distortions of reasoning, as well as false interpretations of things and
events.

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Symptoms of schizophrenia

 Schizophrenia is sometimes described as having ‘positive symptoms’ and ‘negative symptoms’.

Positive symptoms are experienced in addition to reality whereas negative symptoms affect your
ability to function.

Positive symptoms of schizophrenia

 Hallucinations – Seeing, feeling and hearing things that aren’t there. Hearing voices is the most
common type of hallucination
 Delusions – Believing things that others don’t
 Disorganised thinking – The things you say might not make sense to other people. You may switch
topics without any obvious link
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Negative symptoms of schizophrenia

 Lack of motivation
 Slow movement
 Change in sleep patterns
 Poor grooming or hygiene
 Difficulty planning or setting goals
 Becoming withdrawn – Not saying much, change in body language, lack of eye contact, less
interested in usual hobbies and activities
 Reduced range of emotions
 Low sex drive
 Cognitive experiences – low attention span, memory problems, unable to absorb information, poor
decision making

Kinds / types of schizophrenia.

1. Paranoid schizophrenia
 This is the most common type of schizophrenia. It may develop later in life than other forms.
Symptoms include hallucinations and/or delusions, but your speech and emotions may not be
affected.
2. Hebephrenic schizophrenia or disorganized schizophrenia
 Bizarre. Delusion, and hallucinations..
 People living with disorganised schizophrenia often show little or no emotions in their facial
expressions, voice tone, or mannerisms.
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3. Catatonic schizophrenia
 This is the rarest schizophrenia diagnosis, characterised by unusual, limited and sudden
movements. You may often switch between being very active or very still. You may not talk
much, and you may mimic other’s speech and movement.
4. Undifferentiated schizophrenia
 Your diagnosis may have some signs of paranoid, hebephrenic or catatonic schizophrenia,
but it doesn’t obviously fit into one of these types alone
5. Residual schizophrenia
 You may be diagnosed with residual schizophrenia if you have a history of psychosis, but
only experience the negative symptoms (such as slow movement, poor memory, lack of
concentration and poor hygiene)

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The cause of schizophrenia is unknown, but it is usually a combination of the following factors :

 Brain chemistry
 Genetics
 Complications at birth

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Treatments for schizophrenia

 There is no cure for schizophrenia, but with the right treatment, it’s possible to limit symptoms and
reduce the chances of further episodes.
  Up to 1 in 10 people may have a lasting recovery, and 1 in 5 may have significant improvement.
Around half of people diagnosed with schizophrenia will continue to manage it as a long-term
illness.
 The most common treatment for schizophrenia is medication and talking therapies.

Medication
 Your doctor may offer you antipsychotic medications to treat schizophrenia. These help to reduce
the symptoms, but will not cure it.
 The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) advise that people who’ve not
responded to at least two other antipsychotic drugs should be offered clozapine.
 You should review your medication with your doctor at least once a year.
 Talking therapies, sometimes referred to as psychosocial treatments, help you to look at your
thoughts and behaviours.
 Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT)
 Arts therapies
 Family intervention.

Early intervention teams

 Early intervention teams are specialist NHS services which provide support to people when they
first experiencing schizophrenia. You may meet with psychiatrists, psychologists, specialist nurses
and support workers.
 Self-care and management skills can help you to understand and overcome symptoms of
schizophrenia.
 Your health or social worker may offer to support you with self-management. Or you may be
offered peer support from other people who have schizophrenia.

Self-care focuses on:

 Exercise
 Diet
 Relationships
 Daily routines
 Taking medication
 Recognising your triggers and when you’re becoming unwell
 Maintaining recovery
 What to do in a crisis and where to get help

SCHIZOPHRENIA AND CRIMINALITY

The association between schizophrenia and committing violent acts or different forms of crime is
evident in literature, encompassing interpersonal attack and murder. Compared to their healthy
counterparts in the general population, individuals diagnosed with schizophrenia are 4 t0 6 times more
likely to commit a violent crime.
 Existing research also includes that the prevalence of crime in patients with schizophrenia
is significantly associated with male sex, being single, refusing to accept treatment,
substance abuse and duration of illness.
 Population birth cohort study, men with a major mental disorder, including schizophrenia,
were found to be 2.6 times more likely to have been convicted of an criminal offense than
healthy men and were registered for more crimes of every type.