hy·po·chon·dri·ac
[ˌhīpəˈkändrēˌak]

NOUN

• a person who is abnormally anxious about their health.

What Is It?

Most people have concerns about their health. Our health, both physical and mental, is important to us. It is part of our self-preservation mechanism.
If we are not feeling well then it is good that we notice this and if it persists more than a few days we know we should probably seek a doctors advice.
Hypochondria, however, goes much further than a worry about some condition we may have. It is a considered a somatoform disorder or illness anxiety disorder and affects about 3% of the population.
People with this disorder become extremely worried and alarmed about a physical or psychological symptom they detect, no matter how minor their symptoms are, and convince themselves that they have a serious illness or are about to be diagnosed with a serious illness.

What Are The Symptoms?

Like a person that has OCD and must wash their hands 200 times a day, hypochondriacs are obsessed with what is happening within their bodies. This can have quite devastating effects and may lead them to actually neglect their health. They can become depressed and in a few cases become suicidal. They may have intrusive thoughts which leads to compulsive checking and seeking advice from friends, relatives and doctors.
Hypochondriasis may be accompanied by other psychological disorders such as phobias, OCD, bipolar, clinical depression, and anxiety.

Diagnosis of Hypochondria has these criteria.

A. Either one of the following:
A persistent belief, of at least six months' duration, of the presence of a maximum of two serious physical diseases (of which at least one must be specifically named by the patient).
A persistent preoccupation with a presumed deformity or disfigurement (body dysmorphic disorder).
B. Preoccupation with the belief and the symptoms causes persistent distress or interference with personal functioning in daily living, and leads the patient to seek medical treatment or investigations (or equivalent help from local healers).
C. Persistent refusal to accept medical advice that there is no adequate physical cause for the symptoms or physical abnormality, except for short periods of up to a few weeks at a time immediately after or during medical investigations.
D. Most commonly used exclusion criteria: not occurring only during any of the schizophrenia and related disorders or any of the mood disorders.
Wikipedia

What Are The Treatments Available?

Unfortunately there are not a lot of treatments available.
Most research indicates that cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is an effective treatment for hypochondriasis. Much of this research is limited by methodological issues. A small amount of evidence suggests that selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors can also reduce symptoms, but further research is needed.

In Conclusion

As with any disease or debilitating condition, my heart goes out to people suffering from Hypochondria or any disease, for that matter. For people that have or suffer from this please seek medical advice from a qualified doctor or physiatrist.

I am not a medical doctor, however I do know that alcohol, drugs or self-medication is not the answer and may only mask the symptoms.

Stay healthy everyone!
All pictures are free to use and share