Schizophrenia Essay

This essay focuses on the diagnosis of schizophrenia, a major mental illness with much stigma and misinformation associated with it. World Health Organisation (WHO, 2012) epidemiological evidence suggests that schizophrenia is a mental illness affecting 24 million people worldwide. This essay will define schizophrenia and its characteristic signs and symptoms in relation to cognition, mood, behaviour and psychosocial functioning. The criteria enabling a diagnosis of schizophrenia are explored, as well as contemporary nursing care and pharmacological treatments. The positive and negative signs and symptoms of schizophrenia will be discussed and the treatment and care requirements outlined by the NSW Mental Health Act (2007) are also investigated, while prevalent Australian societal attitudes and how this may affect sufferers is also outlined.

According to Varcarolis, Carson and Shoemaker schizophrenia is not a single disease, however, a set of symptoms that involves neuro-anatomical and neuro-biochemical abnormalities in the midst of strong genetic links. Schizophrenia is an overwhelming brain disease which facilitates the affects of; personality, social behaviour, emotions, thinking, language and the ability to identify authenticity accurately (Varcarolis et al 2006). For sufferers, the combination of disturbances are as unique as the number of individuals burdened with the illness emphasising the need for treatment that is correspondingly individualised, emphasising the need for treatment that is correspondingly individualised (Schizophrenia Fellowship of NSW ).

Schizophrenia is considered one of the most debilitating and misconstrued of all recognised mental illnesses (Bardwell & Taylor 2009, p. 250). The illness occurs indiscriminate of ethnicity, culture, gender, status or intellect (SFNSW, n.d.), although SFNSW (n.d.) observe, the disorder is slightly more common in males. Typically presenting between fifteen and thirty