Schizophrenia -- Defines the disease and goes over the types, symptoms, treatments, detection methods and a few other things. I have also included the works cited.

Essay by FromNatToAshesHigh School, 10th grade April 2004

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Schizophrenia is a mentally disabling disease causing patients to lose touch with reality. Exactly what schizophrenia is has been disagreed on by a number of psychologists. There are so many conditions under the name of one disease. Usually, patients are not able to make sense of the signs and messages in the world around them. They tend to imagine an object as something completely different from what it really is. Eventually schizophrenics will draw themselves out of the world entirely if the disease remains untreated for too long of a time period.

An estimated 1% of the world population is schizophrenic. With a growing world population as huge as ours, this percentage totals to millions of people easily. Half of the patients in mental hospitals are those diagnosed with schizophrenia. It doesn't matter what race, age, sex, social class, or ethnic background someone has. Anyone can be affected by schizophrenia.

Usually a schizophrenic is diagnosed within their early twenties, but the disorder can set in during any time in a person's lifespan. Finding schizophrenia in children is rare; however there have still been cases as young as five years old.

There are five different sub-types of schizophrenia, paranoid, disorganized, catatonic, undifferentiated and residual schizophrenia. Patients diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia suffer from delusions and hallucinations. Usually they become extremely paranoid, believe unrealistic facts about the world around them or they may lose their sense of identity. Having unreal delusions and hallucinations puts these patients at high risk for suicidal behavior. Disorganized schizophrenia patients withdraw from their world around them. They suffer from confusing, disorganized speech patterns and an overall silly demeanor. Many of these patients have a weak personality due to a previous psychotic episode. Catatonic Schizophrenia is shown by odd movement and posture. A catatonic schizophrenic may walk, stand,