John Nash Paranoid Schizophrenia

Thomas Szasz once said, if you talk to God, you are praying; if God talks to you, you have schizophrenia.

It is a terrible disorder that affects many people around the world. Arguably the most famous person with schizophrenia is Nobel Prize (1994) and American Mathematicians Society 's Leroy P. Steel Prize for Seminal Contribution to Research (1999) winner, John Nash.

Paranoid Schizophrenia can be a crippling illness. Its sufferers may not be able to determine what is real and what is not. According to Dr. Paul Ballas (2006: Internet) of the Department of Psychiatry at Thomas Jefferson University, the individual has feelings of being persecuted or plotted against. Affected individuals may have grandiose (over-the-top) delusions associated
(American Psychiatric Association, 2004).Statistically speaking, the earlier the diagnosis, the better the outcome in the long run, but here in Queensland there is only one registered Early Psychosis Centre, it is located at the University of Queensland, St Lucia campus. Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia have four, six and one centre respectively. Here in Australia there are two websites, one run by the Early Psychosis Prevention and Intervention Centre in Melbourne, www.earlypsychosis.org, and http://auseinet.flinders.edu.au/index.php which is maintained by Flinders University in Adelaide. Also www.Schizophrenia.com has an online early detection test for schizophrenia that is for either family members of those that might be affected or for individuals who are trying to understand what is happening to them.

There are three stages of schizophrenia; they are acute, stabilization and residual. In the acute phase, the patient has a clear break from contact with reality usually displayed by a psychotic episode. This will usually lead to intervention and treatment. The second stage, the stabilization phase, is when the patient 's symptoms have been brought under control but
…as a consequence I resigned my position as a faculty member at M.I.T. and, ultimately, after spending 50 days under "observation" at the McLean Hospital, traveled to Europe and attempted to gain status there as a refugee (John Nash, 1994). For some time after that he would be in and out of hospitals. At times his involuntary admission to hospitals would last up to eight months. Eventually he began reject his delusions and return to mathematical research. This period of time, John Nash himself refers to as enforced rationality. He may have been thought to be the entering the Residual stage however this would turn out to be incorrect. In truth it can be said he had not completed the Stabilization period. In the late Sixties, he returned to what he described as a dream-like delusional hypothesis, however managed to avoid being admitted to hospital by behaving as normally as he could. This can be said to be his transition into the Residual stage. Although he had a slight relapse, he himself began to understand on an intellectual level that his delusions were exactly that, delusions. He is now thinking rationally and continuing to further his studies in mathematics with the hope that he can provide something useful to the