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Rav Singh Schizophrenia is a disease which affects the brain and is the most serious mental illness in Canada. The common symptoms of people suffering from Schizophrenia include mixed up thoughts, delusions or false perceptions and hallucinations. Patients who suffer from the disorder have a hard time performing tasks which require them to use their abstract memory and have difficulty paying attention for prolonged periods of time. Schizophrenia has many effects which include delusions persecution, delusions of grandeur, and delusions of being controlled.
Delusions of persecution include some form of paranoia and the feeling that everyone is out to get them or harm them. Delusions of grandeur means that they suffer from a “God” complex and think they are God or have some higher power above everyone else. Delusions of being controlled include some form of feeling as if they are being controlled by a radio signal by the CIA or some other special government agency. Physical effects of schizophrenia include scoliosis (S-shaped curve of the spine), a shuffling gait and difficulty raising arms above the head due to lack of range of motion in the shoulder joint.
Social effects of schizophrenia include social isolation and problems with work and school. People suffering from schizophrenia will find themselves isolating themselves from close friends and colleagues from work. They will have difficulty with education due to the fact that patients with the mental illness have difficulty paying attention for a long time. Communicating with a person suffering from schizophrenia can have it’s obstacles and will be difficult at times. Schizophrenic patients are always paranoid and that can be really hard to deal with, because they might feel that you are out to harm them even though you have good intentions.
I actually would feel very frightened myself treating a patient with schizophrenia, because I would not know how they would respond to any treatment I were to give them. It could be shocking to see them react to a physiotherapy treatment thinking it was going to harm them or some diagnostic tool/exercise equipment was perceived as a weapon. I would be very cautious about what type of treatment that could be used, because of their paranoid behavior and it could negatively affect the treatment and they could not get the proper treatment that would help them in the long run.
One of the strategies that I could use when dealing with patients suffering from schizophrenia would be to not pretend that I understand what they are saying even though I’m confused. I could tell the person that I am having difficulty understanding what they are trying to say to me and that could help the situation. Another strategy that I could use is by talking to them in a calm voice and with firm direction. I would also select the treatment that would be ideal to their own intellectual development and not something that is overly complicated.
I would also not include any treatment that would be related to the person’s delusions. I could also have more empathy with a schizophrenic patient and understand that they did not ask for this illness and that daily living and the effect that it has on their family must be very difficult both emotionally and physically. One thing that I would want to learn about schizophrenia would be how to correct the problem with proper nutrition and neurotransmitter therapy such as the use of GABA, serotonin, dopamine and other amino acids that could correct or help lessen the effects that schizophrenia has on their mental functioning.