Your Mental Health: Schizophrenia

When people hear the term "schizophrenia," what immediately comes to mind is a person with a split personality. While "schizophrenia" does come from the Greek term "split mind," a split personality is not one of the symptoms of schizophrenia.

Schizophrenia, instead, refers to a person who doesn't have a grip on reality and, therefore, finds it difficult or, in some cases, impossible to distinguish whether or not an event is real or not real.

A mental illness characterized by psychosis and social dysfunction, schizophrenia affects about one percent of the American population. Often, psychosis affects the person so greatly that the schizophrenic's behavior will change drastically, leading to the impression that the person has two or more distinct personalities.

The causes of schizophrenia are not known. Medical professionals believe that schizophrenia is a result of genetic, environmental, and chemical factors. The right combination of these factors may trigger schizophrenia in certain people.

Diagnosing and treating schizophrenia is a difficult task. Because the symptoms of schizophrenia are fairly vague and mimic those produced not only by other disorders but also drug use, assembling a detailed medical history for a patient is key to diagnosing schizophrenia. By ruling out other possible reasons for symptoms such as delusions and impaired social functioning, diagnosing schizophrenia becomes a process of elimination.

Schizophrenia also manifests itself in various forms. Some of the established categories include catatonic schizophrenia, disorganized schizophrenia, paranoid schizophrenia, undifferentiated schizophrenia, and residual schizophrenia. Of these different types of schizophrenia, undifferentiated schizophrenia is the most common while paranoid schizophrenia is the most treatable.

The treatment of schizophrenia has advanced over the years, but researchers are still looking into new methods. While schizophrenics in the past underwent treatment procedures such as lobotomy and shock therapy, new treatment methods focus on antipsychotic medication. The effectiveness of these medications is still under observation, but look for improvements in treatment as new medications are introduced.

This section is divided into multiple articles, covering the following topics: what is schizophrenia, the causes of schizophrenia, the symptoms of schizophrenia, schizophrenia diagnosis and types, schizophrenia treatment, schizophrenia recovery, schizophrenia history, and schizophrenia art and artists. To research other mental health topics, please use the morefocus search tool, or see the related topics listed to the left.