Pakistan has 1 to 2% percent victims of schizophrenia that include both males and females. The percentage is less than the reality because mental health is not considered important and people do not go to the doctor for treatment. It is a serious mental illness in which people have no proper sense of reality and they interpret reality abnormally. Strange and insane things are expected of the patients. The patient gets paranoid and has extreme negative thoughts, low self-esteem, and a suicidal mind. The patient suffers from hallucinations, delusions and may become crazy. The main Schizophrenia causes, symptoms and treatment are described here.
Schizophrenia is not a predictable disorder. In some cases, the disease transfers through risk genes. In other cases, it can be because of the trauma the victim faced in childhood. It is an extreme case of depression and stressors can also trigger the disorder in people. Using illicit drugs like meth, LSD, and cocaine can also develop it. Due to the above reasons, schizophrenia is considered the most killing mental disease.
A schizophrenic person is always emotionally disabled and the person is not able to think or act normal. There can be many symptoms to identify the schizophrenic person:
Symptoms:
- Delusions:
A person starts thinking false things which are actually nothing. For example; the person may think that xyz person has harmed him or harassed him in the past. The person may think that someone mocking him. He is paranoid and he may think that he is being followed. Extreme paranoia and delusions may lead the person to physically harm the xyz person. He does all these wrong-doings out of delusions.
Delusions can also be related to love and affection. The patient starts imagining and thinks the other person is in love with him which is actually false thinking.
- Hallucinations:
A person starts imagining things, seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting or feeling things that don’t exist in reality and only exist in his mind.
- Disorganized thinking:
Disorganized thinking comes from disorganized speech. The victim starts speaking strange words or unorganized sentences that cannot be understood by a normal person. He speaks as if someone is talking to him. All the speech is meaningless.
The high dose of intoxication with drugs and alcohol may make the person schizophrenic. Causes are still unknown but schizophrenic people are most of the time observed as alcoholic or drug addicts.
In Pakistan (especially in rural areas) a schizophrenic person is mocked and people say that the condition is “a curse of God” and does not accept him as the part of their society. A villager recently committed murder who was schizophrenic. The court declared him a murderer and ruled that schizophrenia is not a permanent mental disorder.
Treatment:
According to physiatrists, the most effective treatment is medication, willingness, and psychological counseling. However, there is no special type of treatment available because the causes of schizophrenia are not fully discovered yet. Some of the medicines have proven helpful like; Quetiapine, Clozapine, Risperidone, Haloperidol, and Olanzapine.
It takes a longer time to recover and medicines are the primary source of its treatment, but if the medicinal course is neglected in between, the victim can even lose his mind completely.
How long does schizophrenia last?
Although schizophrenia is a lifelong illness, schizophreniform disorder lasts between one and six months
