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Dissociative Identity Disorder – A Complete Overview
Dissociative Identity Disorder
Dissociative identity disorder (DID) is a complex and controversial psychological disorder which involves presence or more than one personality in single human being. People suffering from DID experience two or more personalities in themselves which are entirely different from each other in almost every aspect. The way of thinking, perceptions about people and things, reactions towards various conditions, behavior, body language and even hand writing of each personality is totally different from other personality. As such persona live with different identities within themselves therefore this disorder is also called split personality disorder or multiple personality disorder.
As far as its occurrence is concerned it occurs three times more in females as compared to males. People living in mental or have past traumatic experience are also more prone to develop dissociative identity disorder in them. These split personalities or identities living in same person are not only different from each other in their mental and psychological characteristics but also shows different physiological states including blood pressure and heart beat etc.
Are Schizophrenics More Prone towards Drug Abuse and Violence?
Long term research has proved that there is a direct link between schizophrenia and drug abuse. People suffering from schizophrenia are more prone to develop substance abuse as compared to healthy persons. Some people also emphasize upon the relation between schizophrenia and violent behavior exhibited by patient towards people present in his surrounding. But is there a link between schizophrenia and abusive and violent behavior or is it only a myth developed about this strange mental illness.
Schizophrenia and Substance Abuse
If a person is not diagnosed for having schizophrenia and he is also involved in some kind of drug addiction then this abusive behavior is taken as normal case of drug abuse not as a symptom of schizophrenia. Such patients are often found to be addicted by specific drug particularly marijuana which is mostly found in substance abuse tendency of schizophrenics.
How to Treat Schizophrenia?
Treatment of Schizophrenia
As we know that actual causes or factors behind schizophrenia are still not sure therefore its treatment depends upon the symptoms manifested by patient in various cases. Therefore the treatment methods for schizophrenia can be broadly categorized into two options:
1- Using Antipsychotic Drugs
2- Applying Psychotherapeutic Techniques
1- Using Antipsychotic Drugs
Since 1950s psychiatrists are using antipsychotic medication to alleviate the misery of people suffering schizophrenia. These drugs can be divided into typical and atypical antipsychotic drugs.
Typical antipsychotic drugs include chlorpromazine, perphenazine, fluphenazine and haloperidol which are traditional or older than atypical drugs used today. These antipsychotic drugs treat patient for all known symptoms of schizophrenia including hallucination, delusions, mental disability, flat effects and agitated behavior. But while using these drugs patient must be checked up by his physician regularly to monitor the impact of these drugs over his metabolism, blood pressure, heart beat and mental functioning. In case of any side effect these drugs must be avoided to prevent any possible bad consequences. Clozapine is one of those antipsychotic drugs have been using now-a-days to treat schizophrenics.
What are the Causes of Schizophrenia?
Causes of Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia is caused by a number of factors including abnormal genetic makeup, environmental impact and usual brain chemistry. Here we have discussed the main causes of schizophrenia briefly.
Abnormal Genetic Pattern
Schizophrenia is reported to run in families. People with schizophrenic family history are more likely to develop it as compared to general population. Particularly in case of identical twins, if one is suffering from schizophrenia then there is almost 50% chance to develop it in other as well. Inheritance plays an important role in predicting the next patient of schizophrenia in coming generation. If one of parents, brother or sister is schizophrenic then the chance of its occurrence is 10%. Such patients show obvious signs of genetic mutation and abnormal gene pairs which lead to such complexities and disorder.
What are the Symptoms of Schizophrenia?
Signs or Symptoms of Schizophrenia
Schizophrenia affects the patient’s life in several aspects and cuts off his connection from real world around him. Symptoms or signs of schizophrenia appear in various forms from mental disability to physical anomaly. Some of the obvious and verified symptoms of schizophrenia are discussed below:
1- Hallucinations
It involves hearing strange voices, seeing weird things, feeling absurdities and smelling or toughing unusual things etc. Such voices, smell or things are normally strange for others often with no connection of real world. Another condition involve in hallucination is having severe fear of some unseen power that seems to be negative in character and control. Patient tells that somebody is controlling his thoughts and movements to use it according to his will for something wrong. He also feels that this unseen power will hurt him or even kill him anytime.
2- Delusions