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To date, the cause of schizophrenia has not been fully established.

How is schizophrenia diagnosed?

Diagnosis of schizophrenia is based on:

  • a thorough analysis of symptoms;
  • analysis of the individual formation of the nervous system;
  • data on the next of kin;
  • conclusion of a pathopsychic diagnosis;
  • observing the reaction of the nervous system to diagnostic drugs.

These are the main diagnostic measures for establishing a diagnosis. There are also other, additional individual factors that may indirectly indicate the possibility of a disease and may help the doctor.

I would like to emphasize that the final diagnosis of schizophrenia is not established at the first visit to the doctor. Even if a person is urgently hospitalized in an acute psychotic state (psychosis), it is too early to talk about schizophrenia. To establish this diagnosis, it takes time to observe the patient, the reaction to the diagnostic actions of the doctor and drugs. If a person is currently in a psychosis, then before establishing a diagnosis, doctors must first stop the acute condition and only then can a complete diagnosis be made. This is due to the fact that schizophrenic psychosis is often symptomatically similar to some acute conditions in neurological and infectious diseases. In addition, one doctor should not establish a diagnosis. This should occur at a medical consultation. As a rule, when making a diagnosis, the opinion of a neurologist and therapist should be taken into account.

Schizophrenia as a hereditary disease

Remember! The diagnosis of any mental disorders is not established on the basis of any laboratory or hardware research methods! These studies do not provide any direct evidence indicating the presence of a particular mental illness.

Hardware (EEG, MRI, REG, etc.) or laboratory (analysis of blood and other biological media) studies can only exclude the possibility of neurological or other somatic diseases. In practice, a competent doctor very rarely uses them, and if used, then very selectively. Schizophrenia as a hereditary disease is not determined by these means.

To obtain the maximum effect of eliminating the disease, it is necessary:

  • do not be afraid, but in time contact a qualified specialist, only a psychiatrist;
  • high-quality, full-fledged diagnostics, without shamanism;
  • proper complex therapy;
  • implementation by the patient of all recommendations of the attending physician.

In this case, the disease will not be able to take up and will be stopped regardless of its origin. This is proved by our many years of practice and fundamental science.

Probability of Schizophrenia Heredity

  • one of the parents is sick - the risk of disease formation is about 20%,
  • a 2nd-line relative is sick, grandparents - the risk is up to 10%,
  • a direct relative of the 3rd line is sick, great-grandfather or great-grandmother - about 5%
  • sibling suffers from sibling; in the absence of sick relatives - up to 5%,
  • a sibling suffers from schizophrenia, if there are mental disorders in direct relatives of the 1st, 2nd or 3rd line - the risk will be about 10%,
  • when a cousin (brother) or aunt (uncle) gets sick, the risk of the disease is no more than 2%,
  • if only the nephew is sick - the probability is no more than 2%,
  • the probability of the formation of the disease as the first occurrence in the genealogical group is not more than 1%.

These statistics have a practical basis and speaks only of the possible risk of schizophrenia, but does not guarantee its manifestation. As you can see, the percentage that schizophrenia is a hereditary disease is not low, but there is no confirmation of the hereditary theory. Yes, the largest percentage is when the next of kin had the disease, these are parents and grandmother, or grandfather. However, I would like to emphasize that the presence of schizophrenia or other mental disorders in immediate families does not guarantee the presence of schizophrenia in the next generation.

Is schizophrenia a hereditary disease in the female or male line?

A reasonable question arises. If we assume that schizophrenia is a hereditary disease, is it transmitted through the maternal or paternal side? According to the observations of practicing psychiatrists, as well as the statistics of medical scientists, there is no direct pattern. That is, the disease is transmitted equally in both the female and male lines. However, there is some pattern. If some characterological features were transmitted, for example, from a father who has schizophrenia to his son, then the probability of passing schizophrenia to his son increases sharply. If the characterological features are transmitted from a healthy mother to her son, then the probability of the formation of the disease in the son is minimal. Accordingly, on the female side there is the same pattern.

The formation of schizophrenia most often occurs under the influence of cumulative factors: heredity, constitutional features, pathology during pregnancy, the development of the child in the perinatal period, as well as the characteristics of education in early childhood. Chronic and severe acute stresses, as well as alcoholization and drug addiction can be provoking factors for the occurrence of schizophrenia in children.

Hereditary schizophrenia

Since the true causes of schizophrenia are not known, and not one of the theories of schizophrenia does not fully explain its manifestations, scientists and doctors are not inclined to attribute schizophrenia to hereditary diseases.

If one of the parents is sick with schizophrenia or cases of manifestation of the disease among other relatives are known, before planning a child, such parents should be consulted by a psychiatrist. A survey is carried out, the calculation of the probabilistic risk and the determination of the most favorable period for pregnancy.

We help patients not only treatment in a hospital, but also try to provide further outpatient and socio-psychological rehabilitation, a telephone.

Schizophrenia is an acute problem of our century. True reasons have not yet been identified. The media publish various views on the etiology of schizophrenia.

From time to time, the scientific community explodes with new versions and innovative treatments that are successfully debunked by devastating articles and new research.

Among the main causes of this disease, heredity is most often put in the first place.

Symptoms of Schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is characterized by a number of negative symptoms and changes in a person’s personality. Its features are that it lasts a long time, going a long way through the stages of development and progression of this disease. In addition, the disease can have periods of active manifestation, and can be sluggish and inconspicuous. But the main feature of this disease is that it is always there. Even if its manifestations are not so noticeable.

Schizophrenia differs from other diseases in a variety of forms and various durations of manifestation. The first signs of this disease shock both the patient and his relatives. Many perceive them as ordinary fatigue or overwork, but over time it becomes clear that these symptoms have a different reason.

With schizophrenia, several groups of symptoms are observed:

  1. Psychopathic symptoms that manifest in delirium, hallucinations, obsessions - signs of behavior and existence, uncharacteristic for a healthy person. In this case, they can be visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory. Patients tend to see non-existent objects or creatures, hear voices and sounds, feel touch and even aggressive influences, feel non-existent odors (usually smoke, rot, decomposed body).
  2. Emotional symptoms. Schizophrenics show completely inadequate reactions to what is happening around them. Out of the situation, they begin to show unreasonable sadness, joy, anger,. It must be remembered that patients are prone to suicidal acts, which are accompanied by extraordinary joy or, conversely, low mood, sadness, tantrums.
  3. Disorganized symptoms. With schizophrenia, an inadequate reaction to what is happening is observed. Schizophrenics can behave aggressively, speak obscure phrases, fragmentary sentences. Patients with schizophrenia do not determine the sequence of actions and events, cannot determine their location in time and space. Schizophrenics are very distracted.

An interesting fact is that when analyzing these symptoms, close people associate the patient’s behavior with the behavior of someone from relatives, usually parents. Expressions like: “Your mother also forgot everything ...” characterize the features of human behavior that are inherited.

Unfortunately, relatives do not see potential danger in such reactions, and in this case there is a risk of missing schizophrenia as a mental illness. And since others perceive such behavior as a variant of the norm for this person, valuable time is lost for timely treatment.

The very correlation of the patient’s behavior with similar manifestations of one of the relatives indicates the heredity of schizophrenia, which is proved even at such a household level.

Schizophrenia, of course, can be acquired. However, psychiatry does not distinguish between manifestations of acquired and hereditary schizophrenia.

The question of whether schizophrenia is a hereditary disease is very acute. In medicine, there is no consensus in this direction.

Numerous publications either eloquently prove the heredity of schizophrenia, then refute it, putting external factors of priority as priority.

Nevertheless, some statistical figures regarding this disease can serve as evidence of its heredity:

  • If one of the identical twins has schizophrenia, then the risk of the disease for others is 49%.
  • If one of the relatives of the first degree of kinship (mother, father, grandparents) was sick (sick) with schizophrenia or shows signs of this disease in his behavior, then the risk of the disease in the next generations is 47%.
  • In non-identical twins, the risk of getting schizophrenia is 19%, provided that the disease is one twin.
  • If the family simply had cases of schizophrenia for any degree of kinship: aunts, uncles, cousins, then the risk of illness for each family member is 1-5%.

In support of the foregoing, history may cite facts about schizophrenia diseases in entire families. So-called crazy or “strange” families exist in many localities. Given the possibility of distant kinship, it is not surprising that many are interested in the question of the possibility of inheriting schizophrenia.

So is there a schizophrenia gene? Scientists have repeatedly tried to answer this question. Medical science knows cases of attempts to prove the genetics of schizophrenia, in which 74 different genes have already been identified. But not one of them can not be called the gene of the disease.

There are also theories about the effect of certain types of gene mutations on the appearance of a disease. The sequence of the arrangement of genes that are often found in patients with schizophrenia was determined. Therefore, there is still no answer to the question of the presence of the schizophrenia gene. However, scientists have determined that the more people have the “wrong” genes and their combinations, the higher the risk of schizophrenia.

But these theories speak, most likely, about the inheritance of a predisposition to schizophrenia than the disease itself. In defense of this theory says the fact that not all relatives of a patient with schizophrenia suffer from this disease. Of course, we can assume that not everyone inherited this disease, but it’s easier to conclude that many relatives are predisposed to schizophrenia. For the appearance of the disease itself, triggering mechanisms are needed, which may include stress, somatic diseases, and biological factors.

Trigger mechanisms

Triggering mechanisms play a huge role in the onset of schizophrenia. It must be remembered that in addition to the generally accepted mechanisms: stress or disease, there are sluggish, which affect for a long time, but have a very persistent effect.

Among such sluggish or slowly influencing mechanisms, the main ones are the emotional attitude of the mother with the child and the fear of losing her mind.

  • Emotional relationship with mother.

Insufficient emotional interaction gives rise to the need for a child to build his own world in which the child is comfortable and cozy. Over time, depending on the development of the child and his imagination, this world is overgrown with special details, which, superimposed on a predisposition to schizophrenia, can lead to the appearance of this disease.

By the way, warm emotional relationships can play a function of correction and therapy, preventing the possibility of triggering this fatal disease, even if one is disposed to it. Therefore, even in families with poor heredity, there may be absolutely healthy children who throughout their lives will not show signs of schizophrenia.

Of course, the emotional interaction with the child of all family members is important, but it is the mother who is the carrier of the therapeutic function associated with intrauterine development with the baby.

  • Fear to go crazy.

People from families with schizophrenia often have a fear of losing their minds, which is also a sluggish trigger. Imagine a situation where for a long time a person is afraid to repeat the fate of one of the relatives with schizophrenia. Fear of getting sick makes him analyze all his actions, events, reactions.

Is schizophrenia inherited or not? This question has remained unanswered for centuries. Many different studies by scientists from different countries have finally been able to identify a relationship with heredity. But here it was not so simple, schizophrenia does not apply to those diseases that are inherited with the help of only one defective gene. In this case, a number of genes are involved, which in turn leads to significant difficulties in identifying a predisposition to the pathological process.

Schizophrenia Facts

The disease can have both hereditary and acquired etiology. Unfortunately, scientists still cannot name the exact cause of the development of the disease, despite lengthy studies of patients and the use of their genetic material.

Schizophrenia is a chronic pathology that leads to mental disorders and a disorder of thinking and perception. Pathology cannot be called dementia, since the intellect of many remains at a high level. The activity of the senses, hearing and vision remains intact, the only difference from healthy people is the incorrect interpretation of the incoming information.

In addition to the genetic predisposition, there are a number of factors that can become an impetus for the first manifestations of pathology:

  • brain injuries, including postpartum;
  • social exclusion;
  • shocks and stresses;
  • environmental factor;
  • problems in fetal development.

The risk of heredity, is it great?

The question of the heredity of mental pathologies is quite acute. And since schizophrenia is one of the most common types of mental illness, the attention from scientists to this pathology is special.

Since ancient times, schizophrenia has caused fear among ordinary people, learning about the presence of relatives with this diagnosis, fearing negative heredity, they refused to marry. The opinion that schizophrenia is transmitted by heredity in almost a hundred percent of cases is far from erroneous. There are many myths about heredity, as if the disease is transmitted through a generation or only to boys, or, conversely, to girls. All this is not true. In fact, even people without negative heredity have a risk of getting sick, according to statistics, this is 1% of a healthy population.

Regarding heredity, there are also certain calculations of the possible risk:

descendants who have a grandmother, grandfather, and one of their parents have the greatest risk are mental disorders. In this case, the risk rises to 46% of the case;

  • 48% have the risk of developing an identical twin, if a second pathology is detected;
  • in non-identical twins, this threshold decreases to 17%;
  • if one of the parents and one of the grandparents is sick, the risk of developing a child’s disease is 13%;
  • if the disease is diagnosed in a brother or sister, the risk of pathology increases from one to 9%;
  • pathology in one of the parents or in the half-sister or brother - 6%;
  • nephews - 4%;
  • uncles, aunts or cousins \u200b\u200bhave a 2% risk.

Is it all about genes or not?

Most inherited genetic diseases have an easy type of inheritance. There is no correct gene, and it is either transmitted to descendants or not. But, in the case of schizophrenia, everything is different, the exact mechanism of its development has not yet been established. But according to the studies of geneticists, 74 genes were identified, which in one way or another may be involved in the development of the disease. So, the more of these 74 genes that are defective, the higher the likelihood of illness.

Genetically, there is no difference in a male or female descendant. As a percentage of the disease, both sexes are equal. It was also revealed that the risk of the disease increases under the influence of several factors, not only hereditary, but also related. For example, the manifestation of symptoms of pathology can be triggered by factors such as severe stress, drug addiction or alcoholism.

In the case of planning a pregnancy for a couple who had a case of schizophrenia in their family, it is recommended that they be examined by a geneticist. With it, there is no way to know exactly whether the heirs will have problems or not, but you can calculate the approximate probability of the development of the pathology in the child and determine the best time period for pregnancy.

In many ways, people suffering from schizophrenia are practically no different from healthy people. Only a few forms of pathology, in the acute stage, have pronounced mental abnormalities. During the period of remission, which is achieved by adequate treatment, the patient feels well and does not experience clinical manifestations of the disease. Despite the fact that schizophrenia is a chronic disease, the duration of remission can significantly exceed the time period of the exacerbation period.

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