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Today, we'll be taking a look at a mental disorder known as schizophrenia. My thoughts about mental disorder people are quite questioning. There are quite a number of people with mental disorders in Nigeria. Hardly will a day goes by without meeting a mental disorder person on the street moving up and down like wanderers. They roam about the street, no place to sleep and no person to take care of them.
When I was young, I don't run away from people with mental disorder not until someone told me that a mental disorder person slapped a man, and after two months, the man became mentally ill. Since then, I always run away from them, on a street if a mental disorder person is coming my way, I quickly crossed to the other side of the road to avoid getting a slap from him/her.
As the time goes by, I noticed many things about people with mental disorder that I will like to share with you Are you questioning yourself?
- What is a mental disorder?
- Are people with mental disorder dangerous?
- What causes this disease?
- Is it curable?
At the end of this post, I hope you should be able to answer those questions yourself.
WHAT IS SCHIZOPHRENIA?
Schizophrenia is a psychosis, a chronic mental disorder that affects the ways a person thinks, behaves, expresses emotion and perceives reality. People with schizophrenia lose touch with the reality. They act strangely and sometimes shockingly. There is change in personality and behaviour when they lose touch with the reality; this sudden change is called psychotic episode.
Schizophrenia is not as common as other mental disorders. According to the research done by the U. S. Centres of Disease Control and Prevention, it shows schizophrenia affects between 0.6 and 1 percent of the global population. Schizophrenia is most often diagnosed by a psychiatrist i. e. a person who specialises in psychiatry (mental distress).
Schizophrenia means "fragmented mind". It is a complex, long-term mental disorder. Contrary to people's opinion, it is not a split or multiple personalities. People with schizophrenia do not have multiples personalities active in their psyche. The bitter truth is that they are not often violent and capable of worst possible things.
On the other hand, people with schizophrenia are dangerous to themselves. Suicide thoughts are common among them, and that cause their premature death.
Signs and Symptoms
The signs and symptoms of schizophrenia usually start between the age of 16 and 30. The symptoms of the disease may vary from one from one person to another. The common symptoms can be categorised into following:
Positive symptoms
Negative symptoms
Cognitive symptoms
Positive Symptoms
These refer to the irrational thinking or behaviour of people with schizophrenia. They are known as psychotic symptoms which includes:
- Delusion: These are strange beliefs that are not based in reality. They believe that someone is harming or harassing them.
Negative Symptoms
They find it difficult to initiate the plan, speak, expresses emotion and find pleasure
Cognitive Symptoms
People with schizophrenia often strive to remember things, organise their thoughts or complete tasks. They are even unaware that disease is in their body, which makes it challenging to relate to them.
Causes
The causes of schizophrenia are difficult to determine because the symptoms can vary from one person to another. Scientists are yet to discover the main cause of schizophrenia, but some factors contribute to the risk of developing the disease. These factors include:
Genetic factor: one is more likely to get the illness if one has a close family member with the schizophrenia
Environmental factor: Researchers disclose that some environmental factors contribute to the risk of the development of the schizophrenia such as viral infection, malnutrition before birth, problems during birth.
Treatment
There is no cure for schizophrenia, but there is a certain treatment that helps to reduce the symptoms of the illness. People with schizophrenia can live a successful life with proper treatment.
1. medication: People with schizophrenia are most commonly treated with antipsychotic medication. They are drugs that help to reduce the most troubling symptoms such as delusion, hallucination, and other thinking problem.They can be in pill, liquid or injection form while some are injection that is given once or twice in a month. Such drugs include trifluoperazine, perphenazine, haloperidol, chlorpromazine etc. 2. Psychological therapy: While medication helps reduce the symptoms of schizophrenia, psychological therapy help to teach them skills for coping with the stress, improving quality of life and managing their symptoms. 3. Hospitalization: it is better to treat patients inside than outside, i.e. people with schizophrenia should be hospitalised to prevent them for hurting themselves, as they do have suicidal thoughts and can hurt themselves or even commit suicide.Conclusion
People with schizophrenia are not dangerous. We should not avoid them. We can get them in treatment and encourage them. It is easier said than done, right? Maybe, cause loving and supporting people with schizophrenia may be very challenging but I tell you, they are human beings like us and they deserve our love and care.
THANKS FOR READING..
References:
[1]Treatments
[4]Causes
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