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A Comprehensive Discussion on Psychosis

Psychosis or Phychotic disorders correspond to a set of disorders, which include schizophrenia and other rare mental disorders. The actual number of people who suffer from psychosis varies, depending upon ethnic influences, gender of sufferer, age as well as the specific nature of disorder. Irrespective of the specific type, a person suffering from such disorders always experiences detachment from the real world, hallucinations as well as absence of correlation between thoughts and events. Most effective ways of treating psychosis include comprehensive medication, psychotherapy, mental health counselling and a host of community support services.

Causes & Risk factors

Certain types of disorders in psychosis do arise from drug abuse or associated medical conditions, but many others arise from unknown causes. Scientists suspect an interplay of environmental, genetic, psychological and biological factors to trigger these disorders. Although causes are not yet known, several risk factors of disorders like schizophrenia as well as bipolar disorder have been investigated.

Major risk factors include exposure to toxins like marijuana, barbiturates and ketamine, metabolic disturbances, allergies, infectious agents as well as genetic predisposition. Usually people from a family history of depression, schizophrenia, mood swings and drinking or smoking have higher chances of developing psychosis with time, than people who come from healthy family backgrounds. Psychotic risk factors also include traumatic life events, abandonment, or a bad childhood.

Symptoms & Signs

Psychosis is essentially a mental problem that manifests itself as symptoms involving hallucinations, delusion and anxiety or sense of palpitations. During psychosis, an individual's perception of his own persona and the world around changes completely. While behavioral changes include social withdrawal, anxiety, disorganized speech and catatonic sensations, that is feeling of being unresponsive or excessively rigid, intellectual changes involve deranged thoughts, delusions, overwhelming sense of being controlled and hallucinations, particularly hearing arbitrary voices.

Treatment of psychotic instability

The cornerstone of psychosis management is proper medication. Antipsychotic and antidepressant drugs include Effexor, Pristiq, Welbutrin, Thorazine, Haldol, Navane and Prolixin. Due to risks of illness relapse, these medications are followed in the form of a treatment plan. Since, many psychotic people do not believe that they are ill and may interfere with the process of healing, mental health awareness or psychotherapy may be performed on them.

Is it possible to prevent psychosis?

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or CBT forms an effective therapy for individuals who are at risk of psychosis, but do not exhibit symptoms to validate the presence of the disorder fully. Indeed, this therapy has proved to be more effective than prescribed medications for preventing occurrence of psychotic symptoms. Individuals who are expressing a noticeable change in behaviour and speech may be developing psychotic symptoms and providing support to such a person in the form of counselling, education, understanding and acceptance can prove to be extremely effective in negating full-blown occurrence of psychosis. Women who developed conditions of postpartum psychosis during previous delivery should opt for pre-term delivery in subsequent pregnancy, to prevent recurrence of the episode.

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