The Psychotropic Effect

The Psychotropic Effect As time progresses, the understanding of the human brain continues to grow. Along with this growth, there has been an increase in knowledge about psychological disorders. New theories of therapy and treatments evolve from this knowledge. Some of those theories, including psychopharmacology or pharmacotherapy, involve medication, known as psychotropic drugs. The effectiveness and possibility of adverse effects of these medications has been a great controversy in the psychiatric field ever since they were first created. Even though some scientists still question it, studies have proven that the risks of adverse effects are minimal in comparison to the great effectiveness of psychotropic drugs. Psychotropic drugs can be effective for treating the positive symptoms of schizophrenia. Positive symptoms include delusions, disordered thoughts and speech, and tactile, auditory, visual, olfactory and gustatory hallucinations, typically regarded as manifestations of psychosis. Psychotropic medications treat these symptoms by changing the amounts of dopamine, serotonin, noradrenaline and acetylcholine in the brain to a more normal level. The decrease in dopamine reduces the hallucinations, a decrease in noradrenaline and acetylcholine reduce delusions, and the disordered thoughts and speech. All of these symptom reductions help the patient reach a point where they can successfully undergo psychotherapy. Treatment with psychotropic drugs is usually considered first when the patient is experiencing intense or acute symptoms, the patient sees a primary care physician, when the patient has a family member who has been helped with medication, or when there are financial and/or time constraints. If a patient has had a biological relative that had good experiences with medication, they are more than likely to achieve similar results because of the similar biology. When financial and time constraints become an issue, the patient can request psychotropic