Schizophrenia is a psychotic disorder that involves problems in cognition, behaviour and emotions. In simpler words, there is a mismatch in their world and the real world. The perception of the real world is abnormal and hence it reflects in their thoughts, emotions, behaviour and speech.
Patient can present with aggression or violence in which case, urgent care becomes necessary. The illness can present anywhere 20 to 50 years of age. In rare cases, some patients have presented with schizophrenia as early as 13 years of age.
Primary symptoms include delusions, hallucinations and disorganised speech.
Delusion: It is a false, firm and fixed belief that the patient believes in, no matter any amount of proof given against it. There are multiple types of delusions. A few examples include:
Delusion of Grandeur: The patient has highly raised self-esteem, and believes themselves to be superior to others. They might start believing that they have certain power, identity or knowledge.
Delusion of persecution: The patient feels that everyone around them, wants to harm them in some way and are plotting against them.
Delusion of Reference: The patient believes that people are talking about them.
Delusion of infidelity: The patient believes that their spouse/partner is cheating on them.
Erotomania: The patient believes that a person of higher stature is in love with them. This may lead to the patient stalking them or trying to get in touch with them.
There are many other delusions like somatic, jealousy, bizarre and sometimes more than one delusion may be present in one patient.
Hallucinations: It is the false perception in the absence of a stimuli. It can arise from any of our senses like auditory (hearing voices), visual (sight), olfactory (smell), gustatory (taste) and tactile (touch).
The most common type of hallucination is auditory and the others are rarely seen.
Disorganised speech and behaviour
There are many examples of disorganised speech like flight of ideas, word salad, neologism etc. Patient has lack of association with the real world because of which the speech reflects the same.
Disorganised behaviour includes inappropriate behaviour like removing clothes in public, poor hygiene habits, poor bathroom habits etc.
Associated symptoms: Schizophrenia may present with other associated symptoms like:
Clinical assessments and scales are used for diagnosis.
Medication: Anti-psychotics medicines are used in the treatment of schizophrenia as first choice, however the treatment protocol depends on the condition of the patient.
ECT: ECT is considered to be the gold standard in the treatment of Schizophrenia. Detailed explanation is given in the services provided.
rTMS: This treatment works well in the resolution of negative symptoms.
