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Schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is a severe and chronic brain disorder in which a person interprets actual reality abnormally. It is a mental disorder that makes it difficult to think clearly, have normal responses to emotions, act normal in a social setting, and tell the difference between their own interpretation of reality and actual reality. There are several types of Schizophrenia: paranoid, undifferentiated, disorganized, residual, and catatonic schizophrenia. The assumption is that schizophrenia is split or multiple personalities. Schizophrenia is defined as “split mind” but this references the disruption in normal balance of emotions and thinking. Schizophrenia is a chronic condition that requires lifelong treatment. …show more content…

This decreases the signs of schizophrenic behavior and improves behavior by creating a neutral state between rest and digest and flight or fight. Quetiapine is another drug that serves as an antagonizer of serotonin and dopamine along with being an antagonist to histamine and adrenergic receptors. Histamine causes capillary dilation and constriction of smooth muscle in the bronchials and decreases overall blood pressure. This drug decreases delusions, hallucinations, and depression by blocking the action of histamine and the flight or fight response. Clozapine binds specifically to dopamine receptors but also has anti cholinergic blocking activity which in return decreases schizophrenic behavior by reducing flight or fight response and regulating emotion. Anti-depression/anti-anxiety medication Welbutin and Ativan are used to target more specific symptoms. Welbutin is used to decrease depression symptoms by blocking the reuptake of dopamine and increases the uptake of norepinephrine and serotonin. Ativan depresses the central nervous system by increasing GABA activity, therefore decreasing anxiety. All these drugs can have the side effects of weight gain, diabetes, and high blood pressure. MRI’s and PET scans can also be used to monitor physiologic damage and progression of schizophrenia. Since

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